Photo Shoot

The blood on my mannequin unfortunately faded.
I wiped it off, and started over with acrylic paint.
I tried my best to mimic the natural flow of liquid.

 I feel that using acrylic paint was a much better idea in the end. It dried quickly, and the use of my small paintbrush also allowed me to add details above and around the axe blade, for extra depth.

I even dotted some "blood" onto the nearest flower, to very subtly merge the discord with the beauty of the piece.

Then, I began to experiment with lighting in a dark room.

I achieved a range of interesting images.

I focused on lighting the piece from the left hand side, to illuminate the colours of the flowers and cast interesting shadows from the foliage. I also enjoy the idea that the "happy" side of the piece is lit, whilst the "darker" side of the piece is quite literally darker.

This makes it even more difficult to notice the blood and the axe amongst the scattered lighting, further illuminating the metaphorical ignorance of man.

This image is especially interesting to me due to the single shadow cast across the mannequin's face. It reminds me of  Jess Riva Cooper's work, where she incorporates 3D flowers with 2D paintings, across and around the face. The 2D shadow could mimic a painted marking on the mannequin's face.

Some of these images are difficult to understand due to how close they are to the details of the mannequin, alongside the harsh lighting. I think that they create interesting, ambiguous pieces.

Whilst I was taking photos, I experimented briefly with a scarf.

I thought that wrapping a scarf around her "neck" would make her look slightly more human, by concealing her imaginary body.

The effect is interesting here. Draping the scarf over the axe made it look like she had a broad shoulder. Whilst the scarf is not ideal, and I could have done with a simpler, plain scarf, the idea was still there.

As a brief experiment, I draped the entire scarf over the top of the sculpture. This left a small, interesting window to the throat section of the sculpture, showing only some flowers and some blood. This created an incredibly ambiguous, incredibly difficult to understand photograph.

My favourite images of those that I have taken today are these: