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Sunday, April 23, 2017

Photography: 'Grimm Compact' by Laura Zalenga

 We've been wanting to share German photographer, Laura Zalenga's fairy tale series, titled Grimm Compact. Created as an homage to tales printed by the Grimms, the photos show a key or iconic active moment from a fairy tale, frozen in the frame and, usually, zoomed in. It's a unique a wonderful way to distill a fairy tale down to a recognizable moment, without words and without much context, and it's one of the best series - whether illustrative or photographic - that we've seen, do this.

(Laura) is convinced that photography is a type of therapy that gives you the ability to heal yourself and others.
"Till today that big Old Brothers Grimm fairy-tale book stands next to my bed. And quite obviously it inspired me. For this specific series I wanted to create an homage.. but there were already so many interpretations out there. I was thinking about what makes these stories unique and one big point is that they are rather simple but still - or because of that work so well, that Disney turned some of them into movies. Whenever we see a girl with a red coat we think of Little Red Riding Hood, whenever we see a single show some point out that it must be Cinderella. So I focused on these one or two elements in every one of these fairy-tales, that one scene that everyone remembers from the story. Actually that is a thought that I like for my photography in genera;l. We see one frame of a story and the rest is up to our minds." (Source)

Do we need to list the fairy tales for you? These are mostly canonical tales so we shouldn't... Enjoy!





You can learn more about Laura's process HERE and see more of her photography HERE.

3 comments:

  1. Good Afternoon, Interesting topic, fairy, fairy tale, and or oral tales of the same genre come from variant regions and periods - epochs that appear to bring some quality of our own family or heritage when we are in need of dreams and hopes instead of negative film on modernistic topics. Thanks, I agree fairy, fairy tale, oral tales help people adjust to incidents that tend to bring us sorrow, pain or lack of progress. Times perhaps and memory of good story telling may make a difference to children as well as adults. Mrs. Arthur Keith (Annette Keith)

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  2. Wow, gorgeous. Took me a while to figure out the Hänsel & Gretel one - I didn't recognize the breadcrumbs to start with (plus, I'd say those are adult feet, not children's). Definitely a German list of fairy tales - how well known is "Sterntaler" in English, or "Snow White and Rose Red"?

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