How @Stolenbesos Merges Femininity and Edge in her Photography
Writing & Photography by Elisa Peters
Modeled by Molly del Rossi, Alexis Loftis, Jack Nelson, Mavis Parks , Sarah Jeon, Avery O’Neal , & Caroline Sluss
Maya, aka @Stolenbesos on Instagram, is a 20-something-year-old photographer gaining traction on the internet and social media for her “lobotomy-chic” photography. She recently worked with Emma Chamberlain, taking photos of her lying on the ground, fridge, and staircase of an abandoned building as she sported Adidas Japan Shoes.
Lobotomy-chic evokes the aesthetics of the 1990s, early 2000s, and 2010s Tumblr. Traditionally, the style explores femininity through meta-irony, detachment, and nihilism. Models in this aesthetic are often apathetic and mysterious, exuding an expression of unbotheredness to maintain a sense of power and independence.
Common characteristics of lobotomy-chic include flash photography, models wearing messy or no makeup, ironic Christian symbolism, and esoteric or uncanny spaces to enhance the effect of disassociation; models simultaneously act uninterested, as if they are detaching themselves from reality.
Maya initially disapproved of the lobotomy-chic categorization, saying that her photos are meant to be hopeful and optimistic for other young women. Before she started making her own work, she modelled for male photographers.
“I didn’t like the way they shot me, and I didn’t recognise myself in the photos they took of me,” she said in an interview with Dazed Magazine. “I never felt beautiful or empowered or soft or anything that felt like me. I was dating this male photographer at the time, and I hated the way he was shooting girls my age. I felt like all he was doing was objectifying them. He’s making these girls look sexy, but they don’t even look good. What are they supposed to do with these photos? Who are these photos even for?”
Maya later conceded that the lobotomy-chic aesthetic is similar to her photography, but that her focus is in the hyper-feminine, featuring ribbons, long hair, the color blue, night-time, low contrast, hard flash, and models laying on the floor. Softness, as if the figures in her photographs are in a dream or a memory, is a key characteristic to her work. This delicate quality juxtaposed with an edginess — like someone lying in the snow or a scene of something that’s a little gross like a girl crawling in the dirt — is Maya’s perfect photographic composition.
@Stolenbesos’ imprint on the evolved lobotomy-chic aesthetic will be relevant for the foreseeable future. It appears that photographers and artists alike are tired of highly edited photographs and staged scenes, instead, embracing a more candid, amatuer-esque, style of photography.
Having already photographed niche-micro celebrities, during 2023 New York Fashion week, and promo behind the scenes photography for musicians, it is clear that Maya’s work and variations of her style are in. As a woman photographing her subjects, her sensitivity to the female gaze sets her apart in a field saturated with male counterparts. This edge, thanks to her personhood, is what makes her work so beautiful.
