We all remember Alice in Wonderland. Alice is a curious girl that fell into a dreamland. She is innocent. She is mysterious. Alice is a figment of our imagination. She is part of our childhood. Who is Alice to you?
.
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland commonly known as Alice in Wonderland is a wonderful story by Lewis Carroll published in 1865. Lewis Carroll is the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. The real Alice that was the bases for his novel was Alice Liddell. She was beautiful young girl that touched Dodgson’s heart.
“Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle.” ~ Lewis Carroll
This Alice in Wonderland project is a series of portraits of “Alice”. It’s not about blue Disney dresses. It’s not about props. It’s not about replicating scenes in the fairy tale. It is all about who Alice truly is. She is a complex yet simple girl in her imaginary world. To create this imaginary world, I thought long and hard and dug deep into my own imagination to come up with a believable real solution. I didn’t want to fake the look with an editing program like Photoshop. I didn’t want to reproduce scenes from her tale. I didn’t want this to be a prop heavy photo series. I wanted this photography project to be about actual portraits with a darker under tone that still had a magical feel almost unbelievable, but not fake. The effect that you see is completely done in camera. I photograph the portraits through a 100 year old plate of glass. The old antique glass is full of defects, waves, and other flaws. These flaws are what give the enchanted look and feel as they distort and blur portions of the photograph. As I shoot through this antique sheet of glass, I carefully adjust the angle to overlay the reflection on the glass over “Alice”. This reflection creates the dreamy look and feel you see. Who is Alice to you?
