Wow! What a year 2019 has been! This is the last day of 2019 and I wanted to take this day to announce the last amazing woman of my Passion Project 2019 where I aimed to interview and photograph inspiring and influential women in our Sioux Falls Community. I am so glad I did this project and truly, it fed a big part of me as a photographer. What I love most about my job is getting to meet all kinds of people and building lasting relationships and with the women I photographed for my Passion Project, I found myself being able to relate to all of them in some way while beholding qualities about them that were simply magnetizing. I don't know what 2020 holds for me but I hope I can spend this next year as well as the rest of my life, capturing amazing people doing amazing things.
This last woman that I want to introduce to you is Angelique Verver. I began to follow Angelique when I first started my photography journey and what I immediately noticed about her was the passion and artistry she brought to her work. One glimpse at Angeliques work and you will see that, this was not your average hair and makeup. Angelique took her skills and brought them to new heights being able to turn people into various movie characters, fairies, aliens and more. It was simply beautiful to watch! Even more so, others were noticing as well. Angelique began to win multiple awards and was published nationally for her skills. However, awards and publications aside, what drew me to her most and what made me want to feature and photograph her for my Passion Project was her kindness, care for people and support of those around her from her clients to her professional colleagues - even other hair and makeup artists in her community. Angelique truly believes in community over competition.
I was ecstatic when she accepted my invite and our shoot was so much fun! We talked about how we can showcase her personality and work in the shoot and we ended up doing all sorts of things, hence why I ended up editing 17 images from her shoot. My favorite image below is the composite of her doing her own hair and makeup which was so fun to put together. So lets get to it! I introduce to you the one and only, Angelique Verver.
Tell us about yourself? Where are you from? Describe your family?
My name is Angelique Verver and I am 49 years young. I am an optimistic creative with an immense love and happiness for my family, friends and my work. I am originally from Keller, Texas. I have an amazing family both immediate and in-laws. I have 1 brother and 1 sister, 6 awesome nieces and nephews from them and then sisters and brothers in laws and my awesome nieces and nephews from them. When I really look at my village, I couldn’t be more blessed to be surrounded by all of these people.
My little town of Keller started from a little town of 500 and now a serious city haha. I graduated from Keller High School. I was a quiet easy going kid that was multifaceted. I loved art, soccer and my friends. I also played soccer during school years and for many years beyond high school. I LOVED to play soccer and continued to play up till about 6 years ago. My knees just couldn’t take anymore haha. It was truly a wonderful outlet and helped funnel my drive for team work and competitiveness.
I have 2 beautiful daughters , Callista 24 and Samantha 20, that I can’t be more proud of and love beyond the moon. They are my pride and joy. They are as different physically and mentally as night and day haha but share exactly the same in compassion, kindness, intelligence, super creative, beauty both inside and out and an amazing outlook on life. They both have chosen creative art professions to pursue for their careers as well. Again I couldn’t be more proud of these 2 ladies! I am also married to my high school sweetheart. We will be celebrating 27 years this year. Marriage is not for the faint of heart haha its got its awesome moments and then the bad moments but being with your soul mate and best friend makes it worth it. The memories and adventures we have had together has been quite a journey. He helped me grow in ways that I never thought possible. I have discovered my love of weddings was born from my own romantic love of my wedding day. We also have a love of our fur babies and have currently 2 dogs and 3 cats. We live on 10 acres in an old perpetually always renovating farmhouse in the cornfields.
What is your job as a makeup artist? How did you find yourself in your field?
How do you keep yourself inspired and in business at the same time?
What are your biggest achievements? What are your biggest hardships that you have had to overcome?
Humm Biggest Achievements… Moving to a strange city with my family, knowing no one and starting my business from the ground up. No formal business training.. just a strong personal will, God’s help and a bit good luck to get me here to 13 years this year. I am very proud of all the hard work I did, sweat and tears put in. I have taken care of countless brides and clients and couldn’t be where I am today without them taking a chance with me. Definitely wouldn’t have been possible either without my husband’s support, my girls, our families and my mentors. And of course the support of so many fellow business pros and friends. It takes a village and I will never forget who helped me to where I am today… I also I won the Fantasy FairyTale Makeup Contest in 2012 for my Wolf Makeup with Joshua Wilcoxon. It was a National Contest and it was based on real judging from real makeup artists on a panel. It wasn’t based on how many likes you got on social media or how many friends you had. It was based upon my work as a pro hmua and judged accordingly by seasoned makeup artists. This I will always hold as one of my favorite achievements. I also got to be quoted in the CosmoGirl National Magazine. I couldn’t believe my name and my makeup advise was in a National Magazine! I was stunned. Worked with HGTV and then I got picked to work with The Antique Roadshow as their local makeup artist. I was blow away by that experience as well. This amazing show I got to be a part of. Biggest Hardships I had to overcome- haha Definitely moving to a strange place, knowing no one and starting over. It took a lot of will power and praying to survive being away from our families, raise our daughters basically on our own and trying to get familiar with the weather, culture, everything. IT WAS HARD. In. so. Many. ways. We made it through though and still here 20 years later. For my business, was learning how to run a small business on the fly. I knew hair and makeup but all the other 1000 hats that a small business person wears.. well there were days where I was shaking with anxiety, couldn’t sleep at night and crying because I didn’t know if I would have enough money to pay rent, bills, etc. Learning the Midwest culture and how to advertise, deal with the weather, etc. It was truly a struggle for the first 5 years… but faith, prayer, family, creative community here in SF, other business angel friends, kept me going when it was hard.
What is the most important piece of advise you would give your daughters as they grow up?
Find your joy! Stay true to yourself… work hard to be financially independent, be kind to others, take time to do self care every day. Know that your family loves you no matter what.
Do you have any hobbies that you like to do and how do you give back to the community?
I love to learn by listening to my Audiobooks, working for the Sioux Falls Adult Soccer Leagues, reading, cycling, kayaking, hiking, working out, and traveling. I was involved with the Union Gospel Mission Portraits of Hope for Families for about 3 years. Families were chosen based upon certain criteria to receive free family portraits from a few local photographers. I did makeup for any women who wanted to have makeup before their family photos. It was amazing to give the gift of helping them feel more confident about themselves in front of the camera. Connecting with these women, I will never forget. Doing the makeup for them no matter if it was a slight coverage of blemishes or a full makeup.. it was truly a gift to me as well to help make these women feel beautiful about themselves!
Any future plans?
Well learning how to navigate an empty nest with my husband as our daughters embark upon their own adventures in life! More travel hopefully and new adventures! As for my business, not sure yet.. see where God and My Path takes me
What is a favorite quote?
Want to follow Angelique?
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/platinumihmua/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PlatinumImagination.Hair.MakeupArtist/
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