Et in Arcadia Ego (Triptych Photo Illustration)

Finally, I've selected three components for my photographic illustration, Et in Arcadia Ego, individual images from which appeared here earlier.

Thematically, I've always been drawn to variations of memento mori, especially in the Baroque era, whether in the form of vanitas still-life paintings or Et in Arcadia Ego landscapes. After all, they stand as a reminder of life's brevity and mutability, Nature's cycles, the highest and the lowest points on the Wheel of Fortune.

That said, I've never particularly liked Nicholas Poussin's most obvious exemplar, which depicts shepherds finding a tomb, i.e., evidence of Death, even in a place like Arcadia, a kind of an earthly paradise. 

Yet, despite the radically different approach I've selected for my take on this subject,  there are some parallels.

I've shot these images in the Rocky Mountains, their pristine northern landscapes and small towns--not unlike the Hellenic Arcadia. Indeed, it is because I'm underscoring an analogy between the two that I've chosen to use animal bones found here in the wild rather than something akin to a tomb. 

The Classical sculptures are reminiscent of Poussin's shepherds of Antiquity. The latter being inanimate create a different kind of contrast to the bones, non-living versus the dead, visually emphasized through the usage of a shallow depth of field and consequent blurring of the former.

I welcome feedback from those with an interest in similar subjects and/or aesthetics.

Natural Vanitas

My interest in refurbishing Baroque vanitas paintings--emphasizing the ultimate mutability of life on earth, death's certainty,  and spiritual transcendence--as photographs in a natural environment remains strong.

So I've gone back to the deer carcass the dogs had found a few days ago to document it properly. Unlike another recent vanitas featuring an animal skull, these images are not staged.

Of course, the said carcass happens to be located in an area known for bears and mountain lions. The latter doesn't make me feel entirely comfortable, considering that I lose all my normally decent observation skills for the outside world when I'm photographing. (And what would a photoshoot be like without having Japanese rockers serenading and sometimes screaming into my music player's headphones? ;) ).

As a result, I couldn't stay for long. 

The two sets of images below indicate my aesthetic selection process, incomplete on this subject as yet. Keeping only one or two, I prefer the desaturated exemplars in color: 

I suspect, however, that the majority of you likely prefers these sepia duotone images instead: 

Vanitas

I've shot multiple versions of vanitas over the years, including a particularly nostalgic Soviet one with a token porcelain ballerina statuette. This is a minimalist mirror-and-skull version, in which the skull was something I sculpted and glazed myself years back.

(Why yes, I do try to organize my books and music alphabetically, too. How could you tell?)