By Mel Pingeton

Worcester native Rhiannon Doherty, 27, knows that there’s a lot more to modeling than posing or hitting the runways. It’s about being comfortable in your own skin and knowing your body.

Thanks to her past training as a dancer and experience with “body movement” through yoga, traditional dance and even martial arts, modeling comes easy to Doherty. “I have an innate sense of how my internal sensation links to my body’s visual presentation,” she explains.

“Often you are asked to assume a particular mood or expression, or to change your posture to communicate subtle body language,” continues Doherty. “I’m not sure how I could accomplish that without all the acting I’ve done.”

And when it comes to the shoots, Rhiannon says that it “comes down to the dynamic between the model and the photographer.”

“I love when individuals can come together and create a thing of beauty,” she says. “Beauty not in the popular sense of the word, but beauty as the perfection of something’s or someone’s essence.”

With that said, it’s understandable the importance of having a solid relationship with the photographer. “If there is a glitch in the communication between the photographer and the model, both will respond to it, explains Doherty. “As with any mutual effort, patience and the ability to empathize are key.”

Rhiannon recently worked with Worcester photographer Scott Erb and is now pursuing casting calls for runway shows in the Boston area and for summer catalogues as well as working with Mass Models. She will also be hosting a greater-Boston television show called On Camera.

As for what role modeling will play in Rhiannon’s future, she isn’t sure ~ but doesn’t see herself leaving the modeling field so soon. “To me, modeling is another outlet for my artistic expression. Being a photographer myself, I love the perspective that being on both sides of the lens offers,” she says. “I’m constantly reinventing my own photographic work, influenced by the inspiration of others.”

But Doherty notes that modeling was never something she aspired to as a child, describing herself as a having a “very tomboy demeanor and tendency to dress in the most alternative and unpopular fashion [she] could lay her hands on.” She began modeling when she was approached to work as a hair model for a runway show.

Rhiannon is currently pursing a degree in nursing and hopes to work in international relief work ~ much like the work she did in the Peace Corps living in Kiribati and Fiji after attending school in both Boston and England.

The one piece of advice she shares for those aspiring to model ~ but can be taken beyond the runways? “Pursue whatever it is that inspires you.”

You can see more of Rhiannon at www.modelmayhem.com/rhiannondoherty.

Photo credit: Scott Erb