Darlene Foster-Artist: Spotswood NJ

Friday, March 4, 2016

Valley of the Dolls

Valley of the Dolls 2016 - The title of this piece came from the 1966 novel by Jacqueline Susann, "Valley of the Dolls". Susann used the term "dolls" as a euphemism for drugs and how substance abuse is reminiscent of children clinging to toy dolls for comfort. It was the underlying theme in the pop culture classic about 3 women looking for fame and fortune in the entertainment industry and turning to "dolls" to deal with it's trials and tribulations. The background image is an abandoned building I captured in the area of the Delaware Water Gap in Sussex County, NJ. I was drawn by the weathered, pastel tones of paint and how the bare tree limbs on one side arched protectively over the roof. The building sat very close to a road, so for my composition, I added a pond of water with a cluster of trailing vines from Spotswood, NJ to the foreground. The little girl, with such a sweet expression, is from my vintage photo collection. The doll she is holding onto ( which I have to admit might be considered a bit creepy) is from an estate sale as well as the other dolls lurking around in the background and peeping up out of the water under the vines. The sky was rather bland so I added some clouds, a full moon, texture and of course, a couple of crows to complete the mood of "Valley of the Dolls".

Thursday, February 21, 2013

The Boating Party

The Boating Party ©2013 - Some of the 7 images included in this montage have been hanging around in my files since the spring of 2011 until an idea for this composition hit me recently. The base image is a lovely little stream running through the town of Spotswood, NJ that I photographed during a visit in April of 2011. The boat, oddly enough, was inside an abandoned house in Middle Valley, NJ (the same house I used in "By the Light of the Moon" which you can find in the archives of this blog). Speaking of moons, the one used here was taken in Lambertville, NJ just as it was rising, very full and golden. The birds are actually Canadian geese from a lake near my house. I decided to take a few liberties with their coloring to better fit the mood of the piece. A young man from my vintage photo collection completed the gathering of "The Boating Party".

Artist Statement

The current direction of my work is primarily photography montage (the technique of producing a new composite whole from fragments of photographs). I've always been a collector at heart, so my photography naturally evolved from concentrating on a single composition in the camera as the end product, to capturing images of anything that intrigued me for later use in a montage. Antique and vintage objects that have had previous lives are elements I collect that eventually find their way into my work. It's difficult to predict what will be a starting point for a new piece; a landscape with an unusual tree, a mysterious abandoned building, or the haunting eyes peering from a vintage portrait. Once I have a starting point, I begin to bring components together piece by piece digitally in Photoshop until I'm satisfied with the composition. From there, I experiment with multiple filters, tones, colors and textures until the final piece is as close as possible to the original idea in my mind's eye.

"The true locus of creativity is not the genetic process prior to the work but the work itself as it lives in the experience of the beholder." - Monroe Beardsley, philosopher of art