When I offered to model for Alexis Percival’s Unwrapped series last year, I hardly knew her. But I had seen some pictures from the series at a group show in Harlem and their simple elegance drew me to the wall.

I wanted to know more about Alexis’s work and I thought that modeling for her would be a good way. As she offered me a glass of wine and Ricky, her fluffy cat, purred around my ankles, I felt that posing and revealing my secret was as natural as sharing a pot of tea.

“At the outset I didn’t ask my friends to do it,” said Alexis, “because I didn’t think they’d want to reveal their secrets to a friend, but actually I know everyone in the project with the exception of a handful and most of them became friends later.”

The photographs show people peeling bandages away from sections of their uncovered skin. The words on the bandages reveal a different secret for each person.

“I used bandages because I anticipated it being something that could be a wound,” said Alexis, “perhaps more painful secrets than a lot of them have been.”

“The models don’t have to be naked,” said Alexis. “A lot of people don’t understand that. I don’t choose the secret and I don’t choose the body part.”

One of the models is Alexis’s mother.

“When she [my mother] arrived for the shoot, she just took off all her clothes and said, whatever you need. The models have come in prepared and they’re generally very open.”

Alexis doesn’t feature in the series herself because, “I definitely do [have secrets], but I’m not sharing them here. That’s not because I don’t want to reveal anything about myself in my photography. A lot of my earlier photographs featured me. I saw this as a marker of my evolution.”

So far most of the models are women, but Alexis is starting to photograph more men for the project. I asked whether she thought men would be more reticent about revealing their secrets.

"Some people are more secretive than others, men or women," she said. "Just because someone decides to participate does not mean they have decided to really share a true secret."

These works and others will be for sale at Asali Yoga's art show and reception on December 14th.

If you would like to participate in the Unwrapped Series, please contact Alexis Percival at alexis@apercival.com.

Sun Myung Moon with Hak Ja Han Moon during 1972 trip to Britain, before he was banned from visiting the country and 18 years before I heard of him

Since Reverend Moon’s death last month, I have learned that the “True Family” held even more secrets than I imagined. Although I parted ways with the Unification Church many years ago, I am still intrigued by the Church's myths. Public figures are entitled to protect their secrets. But when they espouse the values of purity and eternal monogamy between couples, people can’t help but be curious to hear that these people don’t live by the values they require of others. The Unification Church's explanation is that when Reverend Moon's family members don't follow the rules of their own theology, it is either because of God’s will or because the church membership has failed to support them adequately.

There are sites that specialize in exposing the secrets of the Unification Church, such as How Well do you Know Your Moon, and Frequently Asked Questions to Share, but—unless I speak to those involved—I'll leave the commentary to those who have. There was a recent (three hours long) question and answer session with Hyung Jin Moon, the new leader of the Church in which many of the allegations were discussed.

Reverend Hyung Jin Moon at the Hammerstein Ballroom in September

I learned about the secrecy of the Church early on. In the week prior to joining the Unification Church, while studying their theology in the Principle Study Center in London, the identity of the organization was not revealed to me until after I decided to join. When I went out raising funds for the church, I was asked never to mention the Unification Church and instead say I was raising money for “relief work.” I didn't always follow this advice, and in one of my reckless moments, I went up to Janet Street Porter in Heathrow Airport and asked if she would like to give me some money for the Moonies.

“No, I would not,” was her disgusted reply.

When I started witnessing for the Unification Church, I was told never to mention the organization until necessary. My first student of the theology, a towering young Scotsman, insisted on knowing who we were. When I told him, he ripped the front pages out of our guest book and stormed away, copper hair flaring in the cold sunlight.

We all have secrets. In writing my memoir, Holy Candy, I decided what to disclose simply by thinking about how it would feel to say something. If it felt bad, I didn’t do it. If it felt like relief, I went ahead. Sharing a secret can make one feel more detached from it, as if it were part of a story that one no longer has to be a part of.

Picture of my wedding at Seoul Olympic Stadium

Making stories of our lives closes certain chapters, making space for the new. The epic tale of Reverend Moon’s life—at least in the physical realm—has come to an end, but the tales that will be spun from his empire continue to evolve. I look forward to learning what the next episode will be in the life of the Unification Church that he created.