Archive > Making Believe

In Making Believe, a series of color photographs, Laurie Blakeslee stages sinister-looking toys and figurines in tableaus that suggest mental anxieties. As if performing for the camera, plastic toy figures are cast as surrogates in an adult fairy tale. Pouty lips and eyes, drooped into a melancholic expression, create a mood amplified by the uneasiness of an ambiguous space. In an environment of soft focus, a once joyful expression now implies a false gesture. A rough plastic seam along a bent arm interrupts the narrative with evidence of its manufactured birth. For the characters locked within this photographic surface, Making Believe becomes a strategy for maintaining the illusion of normalcy.

good but not nice
digital inkjet print
20" x 30"
2006
veil
digital inkjet print
6" x 4"
2001
artificial birth
digital inkjet print
4" x 6"
2005
distant words 2
digital inkjet print
4" x 4"
2004
bunnywood
digital inkjet print
4" x 6"
2005
loner
digital inkjet print
3" x 3"
2004
two sheeps
digital inkjet print
4" x 6"
2006
swansong
digital inkjet print
4" x 6"
2004
dust bunnies
digital inkjet print
3" x 3"
2006
ridicule
digital inkjet print
4" x 6"
2006
talking to the hand
digital inkjet print
6" x 4"
2006
fish tale
inkjet print
11" x 17"
2008
mirror, mirror
inkjet print
11" x 17"
2008
animal husbandry
inkjet print
11" x 17"
2008
over the counter
digital inkjet print
11" x 17"
2013
in the living room
digital inkjet print
11" x 17"
2013
a perfect setting
digital inkjet print
20" x 30"
2007
decor of silence
digital inkjet print
20" x 30"
2007
mother works
digital inkjet print
11" x 17"
2007
i dot a told no. 1
digital inkjet print
6" x 9"
2007
i dot a told no. 2
digital inkjet print
6" x 9"
2007