Desire: Playing with Fire
An image from a set of illustrations commissioned for a poetry book about desire - this might be my favourite of the ones I made for this project, and the author also loved it so much that it will be used as the cover, and also influenced the name of the book!⠀
Inspiration:
As I was reading through this collection of poetry, a number of poems hinted at the idea of desire being potentially dangerous and destructive. The phrase that inspired this image was “I dreamt of smoke rising”, which to me suggested a potential unconscious wish towards destruction. The fingers/hand in the image are meant to suggest the tempting nature of desire; to reach out and touch something that you know might be dangerous or painful.
Method:
The hands, flame and background were all separate images made with black ink and a sponge. These were scanned and manipulated in Photoshop; some marbled texture was added to the flames, too.