Marvel Harris: Photographing a journey into selfhood

In navigating autism and gender identity, photographer Marvel Harris turned the camera towards himself. His new book, MARVEL, is an unflinching look at the emotional turbulence of transition

Saturday 07 August 2021 00:01 BST

Marvel Harris. Image from MARVEL (MACK, 2021) (Courtesy the artist and MACK)

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The thwarted desire for self-expression is a common feeling, especially for teenagers and young adults. But Marvel Harris had a more complicated journey into selfhood than most. His autism meant he had trouble recognising and expressing emotion. At the same time, he was also questioning his gender identity, electing to undergo surgeries to better express himself as a non-binary person.

Harris, who was born and grew up in the Netherlands, studied at the University of Applied Photography in Apeldoor. He found that photography helped him navigate the emotional turbulence of his personal life. “Photography taught me to manage emotions I was not capable of adequately putting into words, and to connect with the world around me when I needed it the most,” he says. “With my self-portraits, I give insight into my physical and emotional transition: a lifelong journey of self-discovery.”

His work photographing this five-year transitional period of his life is collected in a new book, MARVEL, which won the MACK First Book Award 2021. The unflinching black-and-white images never shy away from showing tears, hugs and surgical scars, examining both the inward and outward suffering on the path to the creation, and the acceptance, of the self.

There is triumph too – a moment of calm found in the sea, and the exploration of a changing body. “At first the focus of my project was my gender transition, but along the way I found out that it’s about an ongoing search for myself: being a human with feelings, who is continuously developing,” he says.