They the People

“As we look ahead to the upcoming Supreme Court term and the first national elections since the fall of Roe v Wade, we posed the question, who gets to be a person?”

When I was told we were publishing an editorial content drop called They The People in 2023, the year of Barbie, whose current tagline is “Barbie can be anything.” and the film included a trans actor, it felt clear that she was the right visual vehicle for the drop.

This project was an incredibly small multimedia team and a $200 budget. I acted as creative and art director as well as photographer on the project. Adrian Rivera did the graphic work, including my favorite visual feature from the portraits, the addition of pronouns on each doll.

I thoroughly enjoyed making the tiny protest signs and taking the Barbies to the United States Supreme Court at golden hour to photograph their protest. Creating the Barbie Dream Clinic was an insane joy to do.

The editorial package included articles titled: The Conservative Crusade to Define Who Counts as a Person, Here’s One Thing the Constitution Could Do to Protect Trans People, It’s the Alliance Defending Freedom’s Supreme Court, Anti-Trans Activists Are Trying to Scare Gender Care Providers Away, What It Means for Trans Mutual Aid Groups and Abortion Funds to Work Together, You Can’t Learn in an Unsafe Environment, and the photo essay, Barbie Can Be Anything. What follows is a selection of images from these articles. Click on any photo to enlarge it.

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