Research On Christopher McKenney

Christopher McKenney:
I have chosen to do extended research on Christopher McKenney is because his work interests me the most. The reason he interests me is because he is a horror surrealist. Lots of his work involves people wear something strange or doing something strange then he removes sections of their body to add a scene of surrealism to the piece. In all of his photos he always has the faces in the photo fully or partially covered, this adds to the mystery of the image. By doing this it distances the viewer from the model which is something I would like to attempt. Most of Christopher McKenney works has a sort of American Horror Stories feel to it, this is because it has that underline supernatural tone combined with the general 20th middle America vibe to it.

In this image we see that Christopher McKenny has decided to make it look like his model is submerged in the ground. They also have a cloth around their face covered in water which indicates they have been water boarded which makes the image feel creep. What makes this image surreal is the fact that it is unlikely that the whole of the persons body is submerged but it is likely to just be the head which makes this image really creepy because it looks like a severed head  but it is still moving.

Here we see a rather demonic image. This seems to be weird because we have a woman handing her child to a strange floating figure wear a black hooded cloak. What makes this image particularly effective is the pale arm reaching out to the child and the mother with no hesitation handing the baby to it. This makes the viewer think that something supernatural is going on.

This image portrays an image of a woman in a wedding dress holding a fake baby while being surrounded by tiny coffins normally used for babys and small children. This makes the viewer think that maybe the woman has lost her own child either once or many times, (going on the number of coffins), which then makes us feel empathy for the woman. If we follow along with the rest of Christopher's work then it makes you think even harder about the image and forces you to think that maybe this woman is insane and she may have killed her own children. We can gather this because of the wedding dress and the fake child she is holding gives us a strong indication that she is mentally unstable. The image itself is also covered in one late shadow which adds to the darkness of the image. This creates a dark atmosphere in the photo and makes the viewer feel uncomfortable when viewing the image.

Here we see a very plain image of a person standing in the middle of a pathway, because this image is so plain it has the greatest affect on the audience. This is because it creates an environment for the viewer that makes you wonder about what is really going on in the photo. The fact that we know there is a face in the sheets and horns coming out of it make this image extremely surreal and has the greatest affect on the viewer.

This photographer has influenced me to try and make own work more surreal. This is because I think it works well and also helps to achieve that supernatural, horror feel that the photographer was trying to achieve. Lots of his photos have that typical 20th century middle America feel to it due to the clothing used and the scenes they have used. This is something that I think takes their work past that of other peoples because it creates a very complex atmosphere around the image. This has influenced me to try and re-create this type of atmosphere with some of my own images.

To summarise Christopher McKenneys style of photography the word I would use that best describes him is surrealism. He uses this to create an eerie and surreal scene which envelops the viewer in the atmosphere of the image and also works very well to inspire people to try and re-create what they have done in some of their own work.