The Permanent Vacation

Nigora—no last name, or none that matters—has been everywhere. Thailand, Mexico, Jamaica. Topless on beaches, photos stacking up on Instagram. No personality, no brand, no pretense that anything else is happening. She figured out that if you’re beautiful and willing to be constantly photographed, you can live your entire life in motion, funded by other people’s desire.

A photographer named Darren Ankerman shot her for Purple Magazine. She’ll probably get hired for something else tomorrow. The formula works perfectly.

I’m not even sure if it’s envy I feel. It’s more like fascination with how completely she solved the problem most people don’t admit they have—how to stay in motion, how to exist purely as image. There’s something almost liberating about giving up on being seen as anything more than beautiful. Or maybe that’s what we tell ourselves when we’re the ones looking.