A Bunch of Little Girls Did Their Mothers' Makeup

For the record, when I played around in my mother's makeup bag back when I was a kid, I'm pretty sure I went from cute, 5-year-old little girl to drag queen extraordinaire with my infatuation with garish blue eyeshadow, red lipstick streaked across my mouth, and bright pink blush. Guess I was just going for that RuPaul look. So when I first saw that a bunch of mothers letting their daughters do their makeup, I wondered why on earth would they entrust their children with such a task. This stuff takes practice and a steady hand, people! But it turns out that the project was a photography series by Elly Heise, called "Daughter Does My Makeup," who wanted to present the subjectiveness of beauty through the un-jaded eyes of these mothers' little girls. And it's really kind of beautiful.

"One thing I noticed about the girls that came in is that they were the happiest with the messiest elements of their work," Heise told Styleite about her photo project. And that messiness translates to the murkiness of society's standards of beauty. "I want this to affect people that feel pressured to present themselves in a certain way," insists the photographer.

Especially at the young age that woman are expected to being fitting themselves into an idealized definition of beauty, it's refreshing to see the results of little girls just being little girls and their own, personal, colorful interpretation of what is beautiful. Check out the rest of the gorgeous and fun photos on Elly Heise's website or Facebook page.

Images: Courtesy Elly Heise