MODEL + NEUROSCIENTIST | FELICE VEEN | AMSTERDAM

For our most recent photoshoot we had the absolute pleasure of meeting and working with the inspiring Model and now Neuroscientist Felice Veen, who lives and works in Amsterdam. 

We asked Felice to describe her career path and the decision she made to switch things up and study for her PHD in Neurology. 

Here is what she inspiringly told us .... 

 

"Starting my career as a model taught me a lot; it allowed me to explore the world. I had the chance to meet a wide range of people from across the globe in a short time, encountering a rich diversity of experiences. Often, I was just a silent presence, wearing the clothes, but that gave me space to observe—and eventually, to connect.

Through these connections, I came to see how we are all broken in some way. Perhaps being broken is what makes us human—each of us fragmented from a whole. Maybe the difference lies in how we come to terms with that brokenness. Some manage to accept it, some are given the tools to mend it, and others are granted an environment where it can simply exist. In the Western world, I’ve noticed, we rarely allow brokenness to just be. We push it to the margins, label it as "crazy," and lose our curiosity for different or "broken" perspectives.

This realization led me to study the brain—the great orchestrator of it all—with the aim of bridging the gap between the 'sane' and 'insane.' In my PhD project, I study the foundations of inflexible behaviour—a trait familiar to all of us, though in some, it escalates into conditions like addiction or OCD.

Ultimately, I hope my work can shed light on the complexity of our minds and encourage a more open perspective on the diverse ways we experience the world."