If money wasn’t an issue, and you could do ANYTHING that you wanted to do... what would that be?

Were you ever told you could never do something or thought that you could never be a ‘somebody’, and that you should just settle with what you have?

Meet our 11 Wonder Women!

We set out at the beginning of 2013 to find 11 amazing, strong, courageous and passionate women, warrior women, wonder women, to photograph in their rightful environment, doing a particular sport that they love and are very good at for our ‘Wonder Women Photography Project’.

We want to show the world their spark, their passion and their spirit through a series of photographs. We have interviewed each of the women and included a micro-story along side / in the photographs to give you a glimpse of their lives, struggles and triumphs.

These women are truly inspirational and their stories have forever changed our own lives.

All compete in male-dominated sports, against physical injuries, social stigmas and medical diagnosis, and have achieved success despite their obstacles. Their stories show the determination and strength of their character. It’s really hard for women to be taken seriously, just to participate, let alone succeed.

We want to let every women out there know that anything is possible when you put your mind to it.

We’ve all gone through difficult times in our lives - and all have thought it’s a little too much, wanting to throw the towel in and give up. But what these women have taught us, is that in order to go after what you want, it’s going to take a lot of hard work, a lot of determination and a lot of will power. It will take a lot of standing up again and again, after you’ve fallen down.

All of us have wanted to be supersheroes at some point in our lives, but the reality is, we already are. We just need to see the Wonder Women in all of us.

You are a ‘somebody’! Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.



Airlie Robinson - Professional Rider, Equestrian
Carol Cooke - Paralympian, Para-Cycling
Jess Fraser - Semi-Pro Athlete, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
Julia Birks - Amateur Athlete, Gridiron
Shelley Chaplin - Paralympian, Wheelchair Basketball
Mischa Merz - Amateur Athlete, Boxing
Ashlee Hendy - Elite Athlete, Rock Climbing
Kim Offner - Musher, Dog Sled Racing
Sharon Scholz - Elite Athlete, Ultra Running
Katherine O’Shea - Elite Athlete, Mountain Biking
Maaike Bierma - Pilot, Hot Air Ballooning









This started as a personal project of Maya’s as she loves editorial photography, especially sports. As we met each of our Wonder Women, the project’s energy grew. Our energy grew and we were so inspired by their triumphs, tribulations, stories and successes, that we realised we needed to dream bigger. We knew that if this has impacted our own lives in such a powerful way, then we needed to get their stories out to you too!

Being a part of this project, and pledging for us means you are helping to empower women and making a difference to so many women's and girls’ lives. These women could be your daughters, your wives, your partners, your sisters, your friends, even you! If we can touch just one of them, then we’ve done what we set out to do.

Without your help, we simply don’t have the means to reach a larger audience, our voice won't reach more people - so help us scream louder :)

You are supporting and helping shine the light on our 11 Wonder Women who very much deserve to be recognised and Maya Sugiharto, an emerging artist who’s worthy of her first solo exhibition and for her work to supported.



Because the project has been entirely self-funded, including all the shoots and all the Wonder Women volunteering their time, we simply don't have the money to reach a far larger audience so that we can touch other people's lives, without your help and pledges.

We need to raise $35K to:

- Have a photography exhibition that will run for 2 weeks, at a gallery run by a woman, who also supports female artists and indigenous art / artists.
- Print over 60 photographs to exhibit at the gallery (approx 5-7 of each Wonder Woman x 11).
- Have an official launch opening night, where we will be inviting all the 11 Wonder Women and their guests, and also other VIP and VVIP guests. There will be finger food and we hope to make it a special event.
- Create & self-publish a very limited edition coffee table book with approximately more than 60 photographs of the 11 Wonder Women, that will only be available to those that pledge here on Pozible and for purchase during the exhibition (very limited number), so that the project can continue to inspire and touch people’s lives.

Without these funds, we won’t be able to make any of this happen. So this is really important to all of us.

By pledging, you will also be helping the following charities that are close to the 11 Wonder Women’s hearts: a total of 5% of the successful amount pledged will go to these charities:

Living Legends,
Go For Gold Scholarships,
White Ribbon,
LGBTI,
Disability Sport & Recreation,
McGrath Foundation,
Scleroderma Australia
Medecins Sans Frontieres.



- Please pledge. Your voice really does count.
- Share the passion of The Wonder Women Photography Project via: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Vimeo, Pozible, with your family and friends, your co-workers, your boss, and anyone else that might benefit from this or support what the project stands for.
- Scream about it from the rooftops! :)



- Thank you’s on Facebook will be posted every Thursday for anyone who pledges that week.
- Series of postcard sized photographs of 1 sport of your choice from the 11 sports covered by the Wonder Women will be posted to you at the end of Nov 2013.
- Limited Edition of Coffee Table Book to be picked up during the exhibition at the gallery in Nov 2013.
- Logo exposure as a Partner or a Major Partner with a link to your website on Agent Morphe Design’s website will be from 7th Nov 2013 until 30th June 2014.
- 1 x Western Foxes Gridiron Jersey is available to be picked up during the exhibition at the gallery in Nov 2013.
- 1 x A0 Poster Size Photograph of your choice from the photographs exhibited at the exhibition (printed especially for you after the exhibition - note it would not be taken from the exhibition) will be posted to you at the end of Nov 2013.
- 1 x 5km run with Kim Offner and her Huskies on a rig to be used from Nov - 30 Dec 2013, Sun to Wed only, temperature pending.
- 1 x 5 places for a 1 hour Self Defense Group Workshop with concepts from Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Krav Maga, with Jess Fraser, workshop to be held in Jan 2014.

Note:
- Exhibition Launch and Opening night will be held at the Blak Dot Gallery in Brunswick East, on the 7th November 2013, to run for 2 weeks.
- The word ‘Wonder Women Photography Project’ written in these rewards is abbreviated to: WWPP.
- The word 'Wonder Women' written in these rewards is abbreviated to: WW
- The word 'Agent Morphe Design' in these rewards is abbreviated to: AMD



www.agentmorphedesign.com.au
www.subjectmatter.com.au
www.facebook.com/AgentMorpheDesign
www.facebook.com/mayasugihartophotography
www.twitter.com/AgentMorphe
www.vimeo.com/agentmorphedesign



To our 11 Wonder Women: Airlie Robinson, Carol Cooke, Jess Fraser, Julia Birks, Shelley Chaplin, Mischa Merz, Ashlee Hendy, Kim Offner, Sharon Scholz, Katherine O'Shea and Maaike Bierma.

To Pozible: for having this awesome platform available to be able to crowd fund and make a difference to people’s lives.

The challenges of the project when we started was finding the resources to source out the 11 Wonder Women and physically get to each shoot location for those that were a few hours or more out of Melbourne. Doing photography shoots with sports women who for example rock climb, is not something we had done before, so our shoot at The Grampians with Ashlee Hendy for example was probably our first real challenging shoot. We climbed 158m with her up Hollow Mountain to the top (well Maya went the whole way and I stopped short of 10-20m or so) to get our shots.

Then the next challenging shoot was with Kim and her gorgeous 11 Huskies. They say it's difficult working with children and animals, and 11 dogs were not easy! Especially when Maya was mostly distracted with her love for the canine species :)

Following that, the last shoot with our hot air balloon pilot Maaike, was also extremely challenging. We only had the one chance to do this and ballooning is so weather dependant that we didn't know when we'd have the chance again. We were fortunate enough to get two flights over a weekend, so that we could capture Maaike from not only being in the balloon with her but also being in another balloon.

As a whole for the project, once we decided to crowd fund, the risk was that we wouldn't be able to reach our goal. Being a 3 year old business, we don't have the resources to be able to fund an exhibition or publish a book ourselves, which limits our ability in being able to tell the stories and share the photographs with a wider audience. But we had to believe in ourselves as do our 11 Wonder Women, and know that we will try our hardest and move mountains if we have to.

If we don't reach our goal we don't receive any of these funds. And with so many supporters already, it would be such a shame, and truly disappointing for us.

Time has also been another challenge. We are a two women team ourselves and have been spending every minute of our days and nights reaching out to people we know and those we don't know. I think if we were to do this in the future again, we would create a team to solely dedicate to crowd fund because of the physical demand.