Inspiration Monday: Ruud van Empel

Rarely do I come across a modern artist whose work is so captivating and innovative that I am drawn in immediately. Dutch photographer Ruud van Empel’s World series is breathtaking.

Instantly van Empel’s work catches your attention because all of his subjects are impeccably dressed children of African descent. Upon further inspection, you begin to wonder what was the artists inspiration and objective. The children are dressed in retro middle-class attire, and the scenery is tropical and extremely surreal.

The subjects seem to be in another world with the pristine landscapes, humongous elephant ears, and water hyacinths. The children are decidedly innocent with a dash of creepy.

After researching World series, I learned that the children actually don’t exist in real life. They were photographed and their features deconstructed and photoshopped back together in a collage-type manner. Intriguing! The artist/photographer takes stills of every single piece of foliage and collage them together to create amazing environments. The World series evokes The Garden archetype found in literature. The Garden is a mythological archetype that originated in the Greek myths written by Ovid. It is a representation of peace and sanctuary and usually portrayed as a safe haven created by God, or a higher being. The word paradise is also used most commonly to describe the setting of The Garden.

Beautiful!

To learn more about Ruud van Empel and to see more of his work, visit his website here.