WENDY HURST PORTRAIT

Model: Jesyka Dereta Makeup & Styling: Jesyka Dereta Wardrobe, Prop & Calligraphy: Wendy Hurst Photography: Wendy Hurst Portrait Sometimes when I don't know something, like what to call an image or series, I identify what it's not. Doing so lends inspiration and  actually yields titles that resonate with me most often.  For this reason a quote from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte recently stuck in my mind. "I am no bird; no net ensnares me." I also remembered a behind the scenes YouTube video by fashion photographer Joan Allen that I found by accident years ago of a shoot using calligraphy on the skin to add a dimension of edgy elegance. Combine that with a kick I've been on about oversized objects and I knew what I wanted to do.  Months ago I draped my dress form, Maggie, with yards of purple cloth I picked up secondhand for a different photo shoot. The shoot turned out okay but didn't fully captured the potential I saw in that ...

"Small" Model: Hailey Smith Makeup & Styling: Hailey Smith Photographer: Wendy Hurst I have to use a stool to get to the medicine cabinet, scoot the driver's seat forward to reach the pedals and keep my office chair low to the ground so my feet don't dangle. Being shorter than the average American may or may not be the reason I'm drawn to things larger than life as a storytelling device. Either way, feeling small is something anyone, even tall people can feel. Synonyms for that feeling could be inferior, unimportant, unseen, overlooked, unimportant and so on. In this situation I simply wanted to exist in a creative space and use the strangeness of an environment to tell a story. I look forward to exploring this idea again. What I didn't plan on was the giant falcon and/or hawk that paid us a visit with his or her squawks and insistence that we leave immediately. That's the fun of plans, really. The unpredictability that can cause them to c...