No Bleach For Me is a documentary photography project that celebrate Black and Asian beauty. It was created by Yana Binaev, a documentary photographer who focuses on race and gender equality, diverse and female communities.
The project tackles deep rooted issues which young girls face and the society who feeds them. It challenges the false necessity for darker skin women to bleach their skin in order to be considered pretty and accepted by society.
No Bleach For Me is online and consists of photographs with 48 Black and Asian women who embrace their dark complexion. The participants were sourced via I started word of mouth, networking events, WhatsApp and Facebook groups.
Yana came up with the idea after attending an event where she learnt about the trauma that affects some dark skinned women who suffer from poor self esteem, poor body image and resort to skin bleaching.
I witnessed the stories of young people for whom the dictated rules of society had affected their entire self perception,” she said. “in many cases this created a trauma that is either irreversible or one that will take many years to heal. How can the world not see the astonishing beauty of dark skin? So I decided to make a documentary project about it and called it No Bleach For Me.
