Earlier this week, at the Broadway Boys and Girls Club in Slavic Village, six Cleveland girls were busy getting ready to show photos documenting their life to the public.
The girls, aged 11 and 12, plus the assistant director of the Broadway Boys and Girls Club, will have their work featured at a photo exhibition Saturday at 78th Street Studios in Cleveland's Gordon Square neighborhood, starting at 5 p.m.
The project is called IlluminateHER and is in partnership with the Boys and Girls Club of Northeast Ohio. Project creator Holly Fulger, who was born in Lakewood, said IlluminateHER and her nonprofit True Beauty Discovery, were born out of years of working as an actress, writer and producer. She played opposite Jamie Lee Curtis on the ABC sitcom "Anything But Love," among dozens of other roles on TV and film.
"As an actress, it seemed like every single thing was about how I looked, if I was right enough, if I was this enough, that enough," she explained.
Fulger said one goal of the project and her nonprofit is to combat self-esteem and self-image issues facing young girls.
"The suicide rates in teens and particularly girls (are) absolutely off the charts," she said.
In a 2023 visit to Cleveland, former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy had called mental health issues among young people the defining public health crisis of the time, as social media use has increased significantly. A national survey that same year found the number of girls reporting feeling confident in themselves dropped 13 percentage points in just a half dozen years.
IlluminateHER helps girls shine
The girls participating in the IlluminateHER workshop were given digital cameras and asked to take photos matching certain themes, like 鈥淎 Picture of Me鈥� or 鈥淭he Mask I Wear.鈥�
The results were wide-ranging: Pictures with their pets, sunsets, even a funeral for a beloved grandmother.
Twelve-year-old Storm said one of her favorites features her mom, where the duo are dressed up in matching blue outfits for her uncle鈥檚 birthday.
"She does a lot for me. She cooks for me. She get clothes for me. And... sometimes she gives me anything I want and I love that, and I'm an only child," Storm explained.
Fulger said she she's proud of the girls' work. She showed a photo of 11-year-old Peighton, grinning with her two-year-old cousin.
"This goes into the theme joy. So this was when I asked them to take a picture of something that brought them joy, that's what Peighton uploaded," she explained.
Bee Puthoff, the 21-year-old assistant director of the Broadway Boys and Girls Club, also took part in the workshop as a photographer and mentor. A talented dancer, she has photos of dance battles in the exhibition.
"My whole reason for being here is so I could be who I didn't have when I was a kid for the next generation for sure," she explained.
Some of the photos are a little more abstract. Twelve-year-old Genesis snapped a somber photo of road signs at night along an empty street in Cleveland. The caption reads: "The small signs once again represent how I subtly stop people from precisely figuring me and my intense emotions out."
Genesis said she鈥檚 figuring out how to express herself through photos.
"I feel like I can really capture the emotions I feel," she said.
When she grows up, she said she wants to be a veterinarian, a gardener and a photographer.
"This helped me slowly build up my communication skills and how I perceive and interpret my own emotions. I feel like I've understood them more ever since the program started and I feel like I can understand myself better now with Miss Holly's help in the program," Genesis said.
And that鈥檚 Fulger鈥檚 goal with the workshop. She said it鈥檚 taught her a lot, too.
"The thing that's been the most moving to me about this whole program has been the awareness that these girls have about their lives, their perspectives, their joys, what they love, who they love, what interests them, that has been really amazing to me," she said.
Fulger hopes to offer more IlluminateHER workshops in the coming year.
The IlluminateHER photo exhibition is from 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 22 at the 78th Street Studios in Gordon Square.
