Living Portraits

These 'people painted to look like portraits' were done by Alexa Meade. She is an installation artist based in Washington DC.

Her innovative use of paint on the three dimensional surfaces of found objects, live models, and architectural spaces has been incorporated into a series of installations that create a perceptual shift in how we experience and interpret spatial relationships.

So rather than a painting trying to capture the likeness of a person, these are people painted to look like the likeness of a painting. It's so wonderfully the wrong way round!






Above, self-portrait of the artist, Alexa Meade

Review: Vanity Fair Portraits at the National Portrait Gallery

Vanity Fair was launched in 1913 by Condé Nast, whose vision was to produce an insightful magazine reflecting the era’s vibrant culture

Now 150 portraits of artistic, literary, sporting, fashion and high-society leading lights, photographed by legends from Cecil Beaton and Man Ray to Mario Testino and Annie Leibovitz,have been gleaned from its glossy pages to the walls of the National Portrait Gallery

In the early selection from 1913-1936, artists, dancers, writers, and scientists, such as Claude Monet, Albert Einstein, and Charlie Chaplin, hang next to society beauties such as Jean Harlow and Greta Garbo.

 Publication of Vanity Fair was suspended in 1936, owing to the Depression and stormy global events, but it relaunched again in the 1980s. The contemporary photos are more venturesome and we are treated to the likes of Tom Cruise, Keira Knightley, Madonna and George Clooney. And of course who can forget that front cover of a heavily pregnant Demi Moore.

If you're seriously interested in photography you shouldn't miss the Vanity Fair Portraits exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, St Martin's Place, London, WC2, £8-£10, until May 26th. I thoroughly recommend it.