04-Helena01
©1992 Craig Ashby
Collage
3.75″ x 3.75″

Number four brings Helena Christensen into the mix wearing guess what? Versace. Animal print Versace paired with a coral necklace. I must revisit Versace sometime in the near future.

Quickly I extrapolate the idea to make this an underwater theme. Underwater photography for the background. Starfish like arms for the halo. Voila, Helena as a mermaid/goddess/saint. I don’t even think at the time I knew that her necklace was coral.

At this point the destruction of the layers is out of control. No more simple sanding. I was using a metal working tool and a broken X-Acto blade to terrorize the layers. This is another idea I must revisit soon. Next time, I need to push the boundaries further than ever. I see layers of the same shape cut over and over, pulled and torn violently from the image.

Which reminds me that each of these ideas must be reinvented. I have two ideas for new series that are unlike anything I have done so far. But then I want to revisit these ideas. New approaches with a new set of skills and my new bag of tools.

I want to do this not to make better images or create a revisionist history of my art but to show how much my mind and eye have changed over the course of these twenty years. But first, two or three more new series and then maybe back to the past.