Open Theme nominee

In this series of intimate images, I negotiate the uneasy relationship between the female body and the medical gaze during perimenopause.

When a routine ultrasound uncovered a fibroid in my uterine lining, I chose not to allow clinical language to be the only story. I transformed this unwelcome growth into a tactile metaphor — an everyday raspberry — making photographs as a way to know it, rather than to pathologize.

The series "Foreign Body" reframes this common, hidden condition with curiosity, tenderness, and quiet humour. Through these images, I stage an encounter between shrinking and growth, intruder and companion, loss and insistence.

The work is a small reclaiming of agency over how women’s evolving bodies are seen. It invites viewers to sit with contradiction and to consider menopause and bodily change with care instead of fear.

Rachel Nixon is a British-Canadian fine art photographer – and former journalist – based in Vancouver.

Having lived and worked across continents and cultures, Rachel explores issues such as heritage, grief, isolation and memory. She is intrigued by the visual poetry of everyday life and seeks out images speaking to beauty and broader messages in the seemingly mundane.

In 2019, Rachel graduated with honours from the VanArts professional photography program in Vancouver. Her work has been exhibited internationally and received accolades including four Julia Margaret Cameron Awards.

Before committing full-time to visual art, Rachel had a 20-year career as a journalist and executive in the UK, US and Canada for organizations including the BBC, CBC and Microsoft where she developed and ran digital news services.

She brings her editorial and photographic experience to her volunteer role as Editor of WE ARE Magazine, a publication of the Royal Photographic Society’s Women in Photography group.

Rachel holds a first-class degree from the University of Oxford in Modern Languages, and is fluent in French and German. Her international experience brings with it a unique perspective on questions of identity, place and belonging, and the connections we share despite our polarized times.