I fell in love with my plastic Stormtrooper the first time I saw him. I fell for his shoes first. Then I saw the rest and I was totally lost.  I love the helmet and the expression. After my project with Stormtroopers, I’ve been falling in love with my subjects in periods. It happens both when I photograph toys as well as when I photograph people. Out of love, I want to come back to these subjects that I’ve fallen for, again and again,  I can not get enough …

I’m in love with a new toy

For the moment, I feel that feeling when I look at a toy I borrowed from Earth People. It’s a wrestler. It’s as plastic as plastic toys can be, and he is anything but flexible or beautiful. The pictures I take of this wrestler feel like documentation. I don’t want to or can’t capture the feelings I have toward this figure. My images don’t seem to lift. I wish they would, because then I wouldn’t have to struggle. I’m so in love with what I see, but I’m not impressed with the result, because I can’t capture all that I see or feel.

When I look at this toy I see so much that I seem to fall for. To some extent, this toy is a symbol of  attributes that I admire; he’s strong, independent, but at the same time very ridiculous. In my imagination he isn’t aware of that or maybe he is but he doesn’t care. He has a mask and a cape – both are pink. In my eyes is he an anti-hero, a bit ugly, stubborn and truly ridiculous in his apperence. But at the same time his is also strong and independent. The toy is priceless and wonderful … I’m completely lost and totally in love.

a fallen wrestler

I don’t know how I should portray my new love

I only have one small problem. Even though I can’t get enough of this subject, I do not know how I should use my feelings to tell his story (or if it’s my story that I want to tell through him. I’m not sure). I haven’t found an expression to convey the feelings that this wrestler arouses. My emotions are contradictory – he’s strong and dangling, a hero wearing a pink mask – and yet nothing like a classic hero with his pink tights and his pink cape. So while I’m looking for an expression, I continue to document my “new” love with my camera.

Kristina

P.S. Taking out my Trooper to photograph for this post made me feel the same feelings I always do when I look at that toy through my camera 🙂

“There is no love like the first love.”