Jacqueline "Jay" Fuchs grew up in rural Switzerland, in a house where orders were louder than conversations. Her father was an old-school patriarch, rough and dominant. Closeness was rare, warmth a foreign word. Today, there is hardly any contact with her parents, not even with her sister. Family is a language that she has long since forgotten. - She learned early on to stand alone and avoid any dependency. She wants to be seen as a woman, but on her own terms. Her muscles are not a wall against femininity, but a different architecture for it. Beauty, sensuality, sensitivity - it's all there, just not in the packaging that the glossy magazine prefers. She only had relationships with men, usually complicated ones - closeness was never a given, but always something that had to be fought for.

Our first meeting was almost fifteen years ago. She knew my work and wanted to work with me. We arranged to meet in a café in Zug. When Jay entered the room, it was as if gravity changed. Conversations faltered, espresso cups stopped moving. We asked ourselves: Man? Woman? Statue? Fake? I was fascinated - the chemistry between us was immediately right. My ideas for a collaboration were simple: no classic bodybuilding poses, no muscle circus - but something that surprises, that provokes. Jay's eyes lit up - exactly her terrain.

I didn't want chains, I didn't want a gym backdrop, I wanted something crazy. So I asked her to bring a raw squid to the first shoot - somehow fitting: she feeds almost exclusively on fish, living in a symbiosis of protein and discipline. The squid as a metaphor for transformation - half human, half sea creature. My make-up artist was less enthusiastic when the tentacles found their way onto Jay's head and oil shone over the muscle reliefs. Jay? She laughed as if I had given her a present. A few hours after the shoot, she texted me that she had eaten the octopus - it tasted delicious. I found that bizarre, but consistent.