Mihaela Noroc - The Atlas of Beauty: Women of the World in 500 Portraits

Thank you for embarking on this journey with me. Im Mihaela Noroc, the one on the back of this motorcycle. This colorful journey will take you to more than 50 countries, through 500 portraits of wonderful women. Together, we will celebrate the diversity of this fascinating world, but first, lets go back to where it all began.

Ive spent most of my life in Bucharest, the capital of Romania, a place roughly equidistant from Western Europe, Asia, and Africa. The 1990s, when I was growing up, were difficult years in Eastern Europe, with a lot of unemployment and poverty. As a result, my family moved often. Almost every year I would be sent to a new school, have to get used to a new neighborhood and make new friends. Back then, I struggled each time I had to leave one group of friends for another, move from one flat to another, but years later I realized that this gave me the capacity to adapt in so many new environments.

My father is a painter so I spent my childhood surrounded by his paintings, enjoying the diversity of colors. When I was 16, he gave me an old, second-hand film camera. I was too shy to go on the streets and take photos of strangers, so my first subjects were my mother and my sister. Thats how I started to photograph women, in a natural and very low-key way. At night, when my family was sleeping, the bathroom was mine and I would transform it into a darkroom to print my photos.

I went to college to study photography, but received little encouragement from my professors. These were the years of the digital boom, when everybody started buying cameras and I saw myself as just another average photographer surrounded by millions of others. I felt that the world didnt need another mediocre artist, so I quit photography. I took work in other fields for money and a practical future, without really enjoying what I was doing.

For years I felt that I was in the wrong place, but didnt have the power to escape. Then in 2013 a trip to Ethiopia changed my perspective. I brought along my camera, just like any other tourist.

Right away, I was fascinated by the women I saw during that vacation. Some were living in tribes, just as nonchalant about nudity as their ancestors had been generations before. Others were part of conservative communities, covering their heads. And still others, in the big cities, were embracing modern life.

Most of them were struggling and working hard, sometimes facing discrimination as women. But in these harsh environments, they were shining like starswith dignity, strength, and beauty.

If theres so much beauty and diversity in one country, what about the rest of the world?I wondered. I realized that the wonderful women of our planet need much more attention, and that true beauty is more than what we so often see in the media. In that moment, I started to dream again, and found the strength to break from my comfort zone, quit my job, and go back to photography. I started to travel, take photos and, little by little, I regained my self-confidence.

In the beginning, The Atlas of Beautywas just a small, personal project, funded with my savings, known only within my own country. I traveled on a very low budget, as a backpacker, mingling with the locals and trying to understand their cultures.

After a while, the project took off on social media, something I had never imagined would happen. Millions of people were looking at my photos, and my email inbox filled up with messages from around the world. Sometimes people even recognized me on the street. Some thanked me, saying that I changed their way of looking at women. I was particularly happy that not just women, but also men, were interested in my work.