From Katherine Brooks’ interview with Lissa Rivera about her series “Beautiful Boy”:
Rivera describes the photos of BJ as obsessive and decadent, collectively meant to push the boundaries of gender, desire, freedom, and cultural taboo with their saturated colors, cinematic poses, and sensual backdrops. But just as they are a reflection of BJ’s personal experience with gender fluidity, the images reveal a shared experience between two people in the early moments of a partnership, performing romance together despite the fact that only one face appears before the camera. Rivera likens their emotional process to the ways bonds are formed between a director and an actress, or an artist and a muse; two people who grow to “share a deep connection to the fantasy captured.”