Flower Lines

Every Spring my mind turns to photographing flowers. Some years I manage it and some not. The idea for this series came to me when I was looking at some nude studies. I wondered what it look like if I tucked flowers in the lines where the body parts met.

When I was young I remember my mum would drag me out to the front or back garden periodically, put a hand fork in my hand and I was made to dig out the weeds on my knees. It would be nice to say we bonded over the gardening but I loathed it. Since then the only flora I have owned are two cacti. I have had them for nearly 13 years and keep them on the windowsill next to the kitchen sink. They are the same size as when I bought them because I invariably fail to water them.

I do enjoy looking at blossoms and flowers when I have a camera in my hand and a couple years ago I did a project on azaleas during the best spring for blossoms in a generation.

Here is some of my previous flowery surrealism.

I bought the flowers in the two supermarkets I go to on a weekly basis. They usually had no names on them and as a result I don’t know what most of them are called. I found it best to buy them at least a couple of days before the shoot to give them time to open up.

Having to keep the limbs clamped to the body to keep the flowers in place, proved tiring in some positions for the models. They would sometimes slip frequently and would need adjusting in between frames.