50 Shades of Red and the Wolf
This is my belated visual response to 50 Shades of Gray. I don't quite understand the appeal of this movie--a gray wolf takes advantage of an innocent young woman. It's essentially a Little Red Riding Hood story--or Blue Beard.
I keep a Little Red & the Wolf Board over at Pinterest. I've been interested in this story for years. The beauty of these old stories in the public domain is that people can take them, reclaim them, re-tell them to fit their own times (ex : Ruby on ABC's Once Upon a Time). I really enjoy the versions where Little Red is in charge, not a victim, and not rescued by the Woodsman, or anyone else. That's what I wanted to say with this piece. Violence against women is so ubiquitous in this world. Even I, in my insulated circle of post-modern America, get so tired of it, I have to say something.
I used 2 of my very own textures, including an adire alabere (stitched resist) from Nigeria that I've always thought would make a great woods, or forest. And then, the beautiful face of Audrey Hepburn as Little Red--innocent, but not a victim. And of course, the wolf. She's in charge, and in command of her wolf-y nature. More of a partnership than a power play.
50 Shades could also be a Blue Beard Story (Who knows -- maybe I'll work up a 50 Shades of Blue Beard next?). That story has terrified me for as long as I've known it. Here, Clarissa Pinkola Estes shares her way of sharing it with young people.
Photo Processing in Photoshop Elements
Layer 3) Copy Layer 2 (trees again - turned and shifted) - Overlay 52%
Layer 4) Copy Layer 1 (Iron Gall Ink Wash) - Soft Light 100%
Layer 5) Copy Layer 4 - Overlay 100%
Layer 6) Audrey Hepburn Face - Darken 65%
Layer 7) Howling Wolf - Darken 64%
Layer 8) Copy Layer 7 (another howling wolf) - Darken 39%
Layer 9) Grunge Brush to soften the wolf layers - Screen 64%
Layer 10) Maroon Color Fill - Color 87% (changes the blue to maroon --It is Little Red, after all)
Sharing with Texture Artists FaceBook Group.
1 comment:
I think your take on these old stories is so interesting - going places with them I don't think to go. I too don't see the appeal of the Fifty Shades of Grey thing but to put it in the context of little red riding hood - that really does change how to look at it.
As for adding the wolf to your image more as partnership and acknowledgement of a wolfy nature, it reminds me of my gone girlfriend Judi who enthusiastically howled at the full moon. Don't know why she started doing it, but it was so emblematic of her free nature, a nature much freer than my own, and the way she was always nudging me toward freeing up too.
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