Date: FRIDAY, APRIL 17, 2020
Time: 6 PM – 7 PM EDT
Venue: FACEBOOK LIVE

ARTSERVE LIVE present:
Art & Chat with Melissa Vlahos
Join our live conversation with the amazing artist Melissa Vlahos while doing a virtual tour of her Unleashed Exhibition at ArtServe!

The Unleashed Project
The Unleashed Project is a therapeutic, social art movement that consists of the photos from 108 individuals identified as women, ages 18-90, of all sizes, shapes, colors, diverse lives, and socio-economic backgrounds who came together under the vision of the artist, Melissa Vlahos. Through a visceral experience and self-applied body paint, to empower and enable oneself into a deeper awareness of self-expression, self-love, acceptance and body positivity, participants fostered a newfound relationship with themselves that created positive internal shifts which rippled out in their lives and into the world. The Unleashed Project is more than beautiful photographic art, it also creates awareness and dialogue surrounding the important cultural issues for all genders of body image/body dysmorphia, societal expectations and norms, beauty standards, and more.

Melissa Vlahos
My journey has led me on the continuous path of self-love and women’s empowerment. I spent many years of my life lacking confidence in myself in a state of disempowerment, not realizing I had the ability and power to do something about it. A first visit to a nude beach in Greece was my “a-ha” moment that led me on a lifelong journey of cultivating self-love, acceptance, and body positivity. I dove deep into myself uncovering and healing self-afflicted and ancestral wounds. Discovering artistic photography as a way to self-express was one of the turning points in my life that aroused a shift in my relationship with myself. That shift sparked the desire within me to be a guiding light for other women to see all their beauty inside and out and to reach their empowered state of being. And The Unleashed Project was conceived.
The Unleashed Project is a therapeutic, social art movement that consists of the photos from 108 individuals identified as women, ages 18-90, of all sizes, shapes, colors, diverse lives, and socio-economic backgrounds who came together under the vision of the artist, Melissa Vlahos. Through a visceral experience and self-applied body paint, intending to empower and enable oneself into a deeper awareness of self-expression, self-love, acceptance and body positivity, participants fostered a newfound relationship with themselves that created positive internal shifts which rippled out in their lives and into the world. The Unleashed Project is more than beautiful photographic art, it also creates awareness and dialogue surrounding the important cultural issues for all genders of body image/body dysmorphia, societal expectations and norms, beauty standards, and more.
Getting out of one’s comfort zone and into the body lovingly has its challenges, especially in vulnerability. The Unleashed Project photos expose the raw, open, and vulnerable states of being liberated, self-expressive, and Unleashed. Emphasizing and highlighting that is relevant and essential in understanding that vulnerability is strength and that is empowering.

My passion and life purpose have become empowerment; by empowering myself, I empower others. For too long women have been conditioned by society, the media, and each other about how to look, act, dress, feel, and so on that our identity and confidence are being eroded. I believe that “we need to be the change we want to see in the world”; women lifting each other to their highest self. It is time we reclaim our power, UNLEASH all our beauty within and let it radiate out- for ourselves, for each other and the world. Because when we come from a place of love and acceptance, then we can truly be ourselves~UNLEASHED!

www.melissavlahos.com