“What’s Underneath”

Within our bodies, we try to make sense of the stuff that makes us up.

In the YouTube channel “StyleLikeU,” Elisa Goodkind and her daughter Lily Mandelbaum examine our relationships to our bodies and their adjacent beauty. In “The What’s Underneath Project,” Goodkind and Mandelbaum ask a group of select individuals to sit alone in front of a camera, removing items of clothing, jewelry, and makeup while they speak. Finally, seated in just their underwear, the participants answer this question: “In your skin, why is it a good place to be?”

The men and women of “The What’s Underneath Project” discuss gender politics, abuse, physical and mental illness, personal style, and self-love. In one video, Melinda Alexander, an abuse survivor, pointedly stares at the camera and remarks, “this is trippy to me… I have, like, hairy legs and a big belly and hairy armpits and I’m on video, and it feels right.” What makes us beautiful is often linked to parts of us we once felt made us ugly. But why belittle our bodies? “The What’s Underneath Project” is at once empowering, a display of self-actualization and at times, a defining darkness. Sadness, here, is less about losing oneself and more about repurposing dreams. To Goodkind and Mandelbaum, it is our flaws and insecurities that make us irrepressible.

Inside flesh, full of blood and bones, at times hungry, thirsty, happy, or scared, we are inexhaustibly here—so why not learn to love it just a little bit?

To watch Roselyn Lionhart discuss beauty, interracial relationships, and why life is important, watch below:

 

–Camille Dourmashkin-Cagol