Polly Morgan is a lover of animals which led to her desire to preserve animals since then she has photographed animals in her still life photography. Her series of still-life work is called ‘Taxidermy’, Taxidermy is the art of preparing, mounting or stuffing animals in a life like way to preserve the animals. Her work looks at placing animals in unexpected scenarios, by using unnatural settings which leads you to look at the animals different almost for the first time to see it’s beauty. I find her images to be very beautiful and seductive especially with the way the animals are positioned as they look as if they are sleeping. I also love how you can see all the detail in the animals fur and feathers which adds beauty to the images. The images allow you to have a close up view of animals which are usually very timid so it is a very rare sight. Morgan say’s ‘I am interested in the moment between something dying and decaying - anything between a few hours and a week. There's something beautiful about that. The wings aren't used for flying, the eyes aren't used for seeing, the beak isn't used for pecking… it just becomes an ornament. When it's taken out of context, people can see that it's beautiful. They can appreciate it for what it is.' This is represented in her work as the setting and props used in the images put the animals in scenarios they wouldn’t usually be in which turns the animals into sculptures. The animals she chooses to photograph have a very vulnerable feel as they look very powerless because they are lying down motionless which is a position you don’t usually see them in. Morgan’s work inspired me for my own still-life as she places the animals in a very unexpected setting, I like how she makes you think of the animals in a different way by just placing there body in a unusual way.
Jenny Saville
Saville’s work usually consists of images of women. She takes the idea of mutation of flesh and represents it in her images. She uses oil painting and makes her painting’s larger than life size which shows the mass of the body’s. The large size of the images also allows you to see all the detail in her work as you can see the surface of the skin and all it’s textures. In her work you can see each brush stroke and all the different layers of the paint, this gives her pictures a three dimensional feel and almost turns them into sculptures. Saville’s work looks as if she has used raw pieces of meat instead of paint because of the blood like colours and how the paint is so thick. The skin in the images is painted in a very violent and bruised away, this gives the paintings almost a delicate feel as the women are painted in that way. Some of her work has an abstract feel because of how the body’s are merged together and the scale of them. There is also an abstract feel to her images as in some of the paintings you can barely recognise what the subject is. Morgan’s painting that inspired me the most is one where a human body is merged with an animals body, I love the surreal feel there is to the image as its two subjects you wouldn’t usually see mixed together like that. The boldness of her work also inspired me for my own still life work as she looks at the way women are perceived and how they feel about there body’s in a very honest way.
Joel-Peter Witkin
Witkin’s images are very fascinating as he breaks down our notions of physical beauty and fetishes and gives us a better understanding of human difference. His work looks at finding beauty in what society see’s as ‘ugly’ such as people with odd physical capabilities. The images have a very haunting and beautiful feel as they show us an issue that is normally cast aside in a very honest and revealing way. Witkin’s images are very theatrical as they have a very staged feel with all the different props, backgrounds and the way the models are posed. I love how he represents issues that are usually cast aside in a very beautiful way to almost show the normality of it, this is the effect I want to create in my own still-life images. At first Witkin’s images look very beautiful but then once you look into them more you notice the uniqueness of them. Witkin’s work is very influenced by art history, from artists such as Picasso, Bosch and Goya which adds a very historic feel to his images.
I'm very pleased that you found my references useful in some way. :)
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