Bow Down to A Goddess

The thing is, I’m okay with winning but I freaking hate losing. It’s in my nature. I mean like, losing is for losers, that’s in my mindset. I know that’s not actually true at all, since at times we just lose. However, in the end of the day, both winning and losing teaches us lessons.

I chose the “Greek Goddess” theme because I’ve always found the power and the divine figures are just a huge inspiration. The way they are portrayed with a background, their flaws, their beauty, and just everything going on with them. It’s mesmerizing to me. I just found greek gods and goddesses to be wonderful characters that can be implemented artistically beautifully. Let’s face it, countless artists have preserved art to celebrate their beauty, one of the artworks that I love wholeheartedly would be “The Birth of Venus” by Sandro Botticelli.

So, I made quite of an unorthodox choice here, and that is to shoot only the female characters from greek mythology. Since I knew from the start I’m only shooting a woman, I wanted to make sure that I have her perfectly portray what she can portray best, the females, the goddesses. After a lot of brainstorming and outfit-and-scene-matching, I came up with 10 characters to shoot(originally 12 but we ran out of time). They are:

Persephone

Aphrodite

Demeter

Pandora

Artemis

Athena

Hestia

Hera

Gaia

Nyx

I met Diana Filip, a russian student who was doing internship in my city(quite of an odd choice there) as a teacher randomly on instagram. I quickly DM-ed her on instagram and we planned for a shoot on her last week in Surabaya. Having her around was an amazing experience. She’s one of the friendliest people I’ve ever known(judging from the fact we only hung out for like 5 days).

The idea Goddess came along with the fact that I’ve never shot a blonde before legit-ly and I thought it would be awesome to embrace all of those qualities with her divine-structure. Just what I need, the perfect portion of a Goddess.

The shoot all fell to the perfect places as my mom’s exquisite haute couture brand, Diana Couture, joins the shoot. Just the thought of those dresses sends chills down my spine, they are just, fantabulous in all the right places. One second It feels so couture, the second they feel so sensual, the third they can be so dramatic. All in the same time. I only planned 6 Goddesses in the beginning, but since all the dresses look so damn good on Diana, we planned 12 instead.

Along Diana Couture, I recruited my talented aunt and uncle I’ve never mentioned before from Baroqco Jewelry. They’re a haute couture brand specializing in exquisite one-of-a-kind jewelry. From the most elegant pieces to the most bad-ass looks, they all fit the shoot so well. After all the drapes and the bling, I recruited Surabaya’s top make up artist/hairstylist, Jimmy Himawan. He is a pleasure to work with, even though the booking was last minute, he joined the shoot and I just can’t be happier with all of these people in the shoot. This is by far one of my strongest teams, ever.

The thing is, I usually do these kind of shoots on the end of the year, but just the thought of breaking the rules, and shooting something just sparks so much joy and light and delivering them through my sort of style, it’s just all worth it. Now, let’s get down to the artistic dissection.

1.Demeter

Goddess of fertility, mother to Persephone. A broken hearted goddess as her daughter was kidnapped and raped to the underworld. Draped in all green and lime, with a fertile backdrop as she nourishes her grasses. Hooded in the divine portrayal, she wishes of the return of her one and only daughter. In wrath to the sirens, she pours down all the water to feed her greens. This all also portrays a goodbye of the soon-to-be-fall-then-winter imagery.

BALLETELLAB

Cold, Harsh, Damned

Reality

I think we all know that, don’t we?

We always try our best to be a part of something surrounding us. It’s normal to act in that particular way. Us organisms, animate beings, are meant to adapt with our surroundings. That reality is the particular place we all are. We are in the side of sanity. We are meant to be—“normal”, you see. But what we don’t really realize is that, reality tends to, break it off. Reality gives us the ability to be happy, and to be sad, but not to be absolutely ridiculous, because that leads onto another path—the path where some are considered the opposite of the sane. Trust me, it doesn’t result delightful for some.

The Photographic Sense Travels: Dives the Maldives

DIVES the Mal(DIVES). The whole idea of building up a continuation towards ‘Maldivian Gypsy’ is to expose something more than the fashion-elevated, culturally implemented theme of the Maldivian, but this time, include a whole new perspective of the Maldives through my eyes. Being on a single island, surrounded by the deep blue, the magical experience carries on wit the waves. Sleepless nights with the waves of the Indian Ocean building up a natural formation of a symphony and a melody, Feeding Butterfly Fishes, sightseeing bats as if they were birds across the horizon, and feeding sting rays and sharks with a cocktail on the other hand.

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What invites an urge and excitement to people to go to the Maldives, is highly affected by the deep blue. The ocean might be the same as any other, but the perspective one can obtain from the Maldives is just exquisite, and beautiful in it’s own Maldivian way. There’s something about the Tiffany Blue hue-d ocean dancing through the clean white sand, approaching a part of the resort so sweetly, as if the day never ended in the best way. There’s something about the sun hitting the tanned-skin on a bright day, allowing the skin to be sun-kissed like never before.

Harvest Moon: October 31st, 1897.

Farm Life, Young Love, and a late Summer Mist. A Day after Summer, and hours before Fall.. Where the Harvest Moon rises up to the skies above. Shining the Harvest Season as bright as a lantern in a pitch black room. However, the only thing it witnesses is nothing but forbidden young love and it’s wonders of betrayal and hatred. Young adults, who’s got nothing but the power and demand to love and to dominate each other under their greed, to love and to hate. The Photographic Sense brings you to a world of what Halloween might have been about, and how it might have been implemented through my eyes.

On doing a Halloween Portfolio, last year, I went with a hybrid-horror mind control kind of view, but this year, I decided to tone down everything with an equally artistic imagery. The perception of the old times being brought to our view today. How the vintage is always seen to be murky, and depressingly sad, how they had a life so free yet so old-schooled, how we can never have everything at once. This portfolio is also inspired by movies like Insidious, The Conjuring, and Sinister. I admire how the simplicity of the hauntings just brings shivers to everyone, how less is more in this case. How terrifying stories of the past can form such impact to the popular culture these days.

The Conjuring, being based on a true event, I believe, has built a strong base on this portfolio on the whole idea of farm-family hauntings, how we human are terrified by these supernaturally, non-scientific creatures. And how our mindset has only brought us to being scared by these stories. It’s completely absurd, because we can’t see our inner monsters, damaging each other and where we host from, the mother earth, and how our ego is being prioritized. This portfolio is a response to how hatred is hatred, how Halloween can remind us of how these hatred can be wiped off by it’s joyous events, but in a way, I have the urge to just do a bit of a cause here for our own race. I decided to style these people in a vintage like pre-fall wear, embellished in a whole new tone of emotion,

Posh Plastic

“Beauty-a complex imagery of living. To one, it may be the old beautiful brunette locks of Miley, to someone else-it may be all of the circus and the side-shaved blonde. To one it may the exotic beauty of a girl from Southeast Asia, to another, it may be the size 0 runway model running down a Chanel runway. Beauty differs from everyone’s perspective-but one thing for sure, we are all created beautiful-some of us just don’t feel like works of art.

Some of us just felt like, we were not born in the right body, some of us wake up wishing we were a size 0-some even wakes up and gets lost in the blurred lines of their identity as a person. As if every soul is jailed inside a work of art, and some of us just gets the wrong cell. The thing about beauty is that, it changes overtime. Back in the days, it was the wealthy, curvy woman, Mona Lisa-with perfect chubby cheeks like an apple who is considered to represent beauty, nowadays, lingerie-ready bodies are the perfect description of beauty-Tyra Banks, Kate Moss, Karolina Kurkova, Karlie Kloss, Heidi Klum, Gisele Bundchen, Cara Delevigne, Coco Rocha, Miranda Kerr, you name it.

The Perfect Stranger.

Love has it's own ways in life, we may have encountered events on meeting people whom somehow we've encountered in another time, another dimension. Could've he been a lover of mine, or could've she been the grandmother of my children? There's always this nostalgic, pre-deja vu sort of feeling on our encounters in life..

Recently, as I'm travelling right now(many of you might've been checking out my pictures on instagram of me being at the Maldives a.k.a Paradise), I read a book released on the 2009s called "ICE" by Sarah Beth Durst. It's a beautiful retelling of the tale "East of The Sun West of The Moon" which is a classical Inuit tale of the polar bear and the girl. It's as if, we were someone on our past lives, going through cycles of souls, in order to make the world "work". I am a fan-well a believer of the Christianity, but these kind of theories somehow interest me, urging me to write about it.

Truthfully, sometimes I have dreams-visions of being with someone of the past. What if I invented something? What if I was the successful dreamer? What if I made a revolution? these kind of key ideas had urged me to finally motivate myself in life-motivating me in every single way, in order to make the time I have worth the wait, worth the success I deserve.

As an artist, these pictures already spoke on their own, shades of blue, china town, two strangers implemented on a slightly ghetto version of harajuku with a slight touch of the 1950s, BAM. You have a sip of Marie Antoinette Tea with Sake and Whiskey altogether. Personally I've had always wanted to shoot on the particular area, the down sides of Pasar Atum, a.k.a the ultimate source of knockoffs, fake films, good-unhealthy, quite cheap feasting, and to be honest, my textile store!.

Even though this shoot personally isn't a favorite of mine(I did love it when I was shooting it), they deserve to express their own view, how each picture are just brutal on it's own. Like f yeah bro we're shooting on the crowd, of course we might know one of these bitches from our past lives, probably?

Life, recently, has taught me something. Be crazy, but don't be a lunatic. Our boundaries are limitless, but we have to hold back sometimes, I know this is so against what I believe, but don't let anything hurt yourself back. And the fact that your instincts speak of the future. Recently suddenly out of nowhere my phone plays a song, and sure enough I didn't pull it out, BAM, it hit sea water. and yes, missy ROXTHEFOX, I shouldn't get a new blackberry since it's being a lunatic everytime lol.

I know this post isn't particularly long, since I'm on vacation and am currently too bored to brag around, so I'm going to sum up a conclusion here. Life is a boundless view itself, we will never know what comes ahead, and who is that perfect stranger. Just remember to hold on to your instincts, and never regret, even though how hard things had always been.

(Oh and I dont mention PhotoVogue features anymore since writing too much of them can just seem so cheap and tacky y'all)

THE PHOTOGRAPHIC SENSE

PAR.Reinhardt Kenneth

Models.Stefandy Yanata Hariono, Izzy Christopher

PAR Assistant/Stylist.  S.Natasia Aurellia

MUA. Cicilia Budiono

Lost In Paradise.

Hey, uni-peoples, so sorry on my 2 week hiatus, you may've realized that my blog wasn't available on the period of time, due to severe cyber crime, my blog wasn't available for any sort of published manner, due to inappropriate hacking, anyways, this is my latest portfolio, shot in Bali.I always find the waves to be beautiful, under the sun, the blue just rise so high, like royal blue the king posses. I also do find the mixture of the clouds just so, beautiful, I mean, God absolutely created the sky from  the ocean, which makes it just, extremely, dreamy.

What I find just extremely beautiful about the island is how it's just an ideal paradise, a vacation-island, how the rich palm trees just grow above you like the coconut scent, how the burn just sweetly burns your skin until they tan, how people from all over the world come, and just, cherish their moments under the bright sun where somewhere else is snowing. Like the waves, I believe our hearts are mend and made to bleed the royal blue behavior, like the shades of tuscany and lavender, and an extra amber from the sun, the colors just collide beautifully,

The title from this portfolio is also a song title by Rihanna from her latest album "Unapologetic", which is pure perfection, even through it's not-easy-listening behavior, the album overall is just wild and honest. I believe that, paradise is just in the back of our minds too, I mean, paradise can be anything you believe in and you don't, like the colors, filtered by the royal blue ocean, grow like the wild mangrove leaves and rosebushes.

Paradise to me, is just something to be beautifully be lost in, as for an artist, paradise to me is my own art God preserved, I believe that, the thunderstorms and the tsunami-s are just a lesson to build a better foundation, to build a better behavior, like a nationality building a better city.

Sirens come and sing their silent songs above the stones in Paradise, and they sing the sad songs of both love and decay, for they are only a creature of myth, for they are only in the back of our minds, for only their rainbow hair is never obtainable, for they are cursed with fins and wings. I believe this is how cliche immortal loathing sounds, I mean, the voices from the sea call you, and you're just looking for weary wanderers, that is what being lost is a part about, and like the sun, love is still warm, and severe.

To the end of the earth, the waves reign, like sequined top down, the song glimmers under the sky like the teal green colors the oceans hare with royal blue, it glimmers to the skin in such beauty, the waves just go to the edge of the world and come running back, breathing the live swimming underneath it, providing a life cycle throughout the continents of the world.

Like brush strokes, the ocean reign and carry a bit more of spectrum in it, a spectrum of life it posses, like the visions of light breaking the clouds, the waves will follow, like the silent voices, it mesmerizes the myth the urban citizens tell, stories about love, stories about the lost, stories about the laughters under it, That is just a piece of paradise.

Under the glory, like all the orange trends that season, the fruits emerge out of their trees, the creation sing, with paradise, with the beautiful imagery under the monochromatic spectrum, shades by royal blue and severe brush strokes. Like printed Hermes bandanas, the heart lines flow with the ocean, they flow with the beautiful sun above it, shining like vitality, shining like essential, shining like an aquatic beauty.

One thing about paradise, is that, only the ones who believe has that, only ones who achieve, and ones who fight all over their live for the truth, for those who sing their grace, and for those who ritually preserve what they should. To fight for the righteous freedom, for a revolution, for extensive, and the youth it preserves, and for the ones who aren't afraid to splash themselves under beauty, for those who aren't afraid to drawn in all the beauty.

Hallelujah, a word the paradise sings, from the pale skin and red lipstick, the word come rushing like the royal blue ocean, like all the poolside memories glimmering under the sequined sun, like all the tanned skin burnt slightly with extensive happiness, whatever the heaves declare, that is truly paradise, in the back of our minds, and one day, where we all preserve the righteous behavior we do.

PhotoVogue Features
The Looking Glass-Paradise.
Watersong
Through The Looking Glass
Dark Paradise
The Decay of Aglaope.
Like Mother Like Daughter
Aquatic Gypsy
Like Mother Like Daughter,

THE PHOTOGRAPHIC SENSE

PAR.Reinhardt Kenneth

Models.Diana Putri&Patricia Santoso

Location.Banyan Tree Resorts, Bali. Special Thanks to Uncle Jamal.

Masquerade Ball:The Untold Stories of The Artistic Womb

The Last Chapter of 2012.

A part of me knew this was going to end disastrous, but another part of me wants to become a part of this, a part of me wants all the fame and the fortune, the money, and the ultimate league, an address of the high society, the society that controls the world, the society that plays the backstage of this horrible drama. The society camouflaging reality onto a better logic, you see. A kiss so sweet, that is how it just attracts you, like honey, all the diamonds and pearls a girl can posses, that’s how it works, it’s a trap and it ends sweetly, it will end with me. That is how I call it, the face of the virtual virtues, I knew this was trouble.

I come out with my beautiful, innocent, crimson heart, I come out and bring that as me and moreover for me and everyone else. My eyes are opened wide, they bring me over, they invite me, it’s like one of those parties I didn’t want to attend at first, but one of the best highlights of my live in the end, it’s a beautiful ceremony when everyone is just-a bit wilder, you see.

Then in the midst of this madhouse, I meet this guy, his eyes as piercing as swords, his cheek bones as striking as arrows of light, but he is the one who has the smile of an angel, an angel so pure I could never suspicious anything more than the word charming. He is as charming as the slight thin rainbows the sky posses, and his awkwardly shy behavior made the colors of his personas more attractive, he is my little lover for the night, or more like every other night, since my mind was set as a long party, whereas I danced my heart through the beautiful tunes I can never ask for more, the charm was all over him when he hit the grand piano.

He is an architect on his early age, he is a man I could never predict I would meet like a week ago, and then he comes over to me, like a crimson, charming unicorn, under the shades of his little husky voice, so sweet he sounded like the thin cigarettes floating on the smoking area on the coffee shop, he is like an ecstasy I can never resist, he is the addictive factor I can never let go, well at least for “the night”.

I am a man and a woman of many personas, I am not just one but partly 12, and this part of me doesn’t want to leave, but everybody else are alarming the alarm I can never understand, I am just a kid and usually these alarms happen turn out to be the part of me who’s right, the part of me who knows and senses the part of the world which should never be touched and burnt down by the darker shades that sound so innocent in the beginning, I am preserving myself in a way, and I can never know when to follow the alarm. The Masquerade Ball sound like my ceremony, where I can finally be hidden and masked

I fell apart on the dress, moreover like under the dress, he is as frigid and cold as his eyes, like the cold blooded creature he is the fire in the water, whereas he is the bigger fire coming over to freeze me down in immortality, I am finally changed, I am finally turned onto a new blood, more like bloodless, my tan skin turns pale, a pale version of my tan, moreover, which isn’t visible enough until I before the next dawn. I am finally realizing all of this trouble will never be worth. I am lost, my innocent is on a vacation and got hit by a star cruise, so every single part of my lighter personas follow me as slaves. I am just this wild, curious, and fierce creature I can never explain to myself, moreover like how I can never explain the beauty of blood, ombre, and inverted triangles.

I guess after all the fighting, the shopping, and the blood sucking, I just have to accept this part of me, this part of me who glimmers under my pale, tan skin which should be visible any time soon, and my hair which is messed around the area where my heart pumps faster. I am hit onto the rocky rocks of my mind, I am finally a feline, I am finally the creature needing nothing more but the prey. Whereas he became animalistic but he sounded more of an innocent, as we raced through our glimmering shoes, which may lead to spirals, he drops me onto one arena.

Everybody else holds an invisible collar for me, they should’ve suspected this heart-racing, animalistic persona which is partly being prepared to marry the dark, to marry the infinity, the immortal, and the end tips of the checker boards, to marry the dusk, to marry the night, the night holding the eye seeing up above. The eye which seeks for his hunger,  for this creature is just darkly screaming deep inside, as an animal, and as a human, as a Hybrid.

But then there’s a new voice inside of me, the voice of grudge, the grudge I want to leap onto, to the addiction which should be no other but my fault, I should’ve trusted his eyes and his mysterious heart, I should’ve sensed his cold persona deep inside that should be trouble for me, a troublesome figure to later become my role model, the king I preserve.

I realized that if he can be as sweet as roses, cupcakes, and glitter, he can be as pathetic as a homeless bird, so my vanity mind takes over, my mind set was being viewed as the femme fatale I became, a wild one, for sure. I am not only fierce, edgy, and darker than the moon, but I am as glittering as Marilyn Monroe, I am a feminist to myself, I am the female empowerment to myself under the crystal chandelier holding the power of masculinity over feminism, a subliminal orgy I can never understand, a pain I should stop becoming. I walk like the glitter I am, I become the jewelry I am worth, I become a pearl and a diamond in the exact same time, I am a final sequined dress, matched under Aphrodite with a pair of Studded Louboutins , edged out with snake skin, I am a woman of red, I am the woman of myself, I am a creature of woman.

But then this little voice of me comes out like a curtain call, it’s fury strikes like an aerial ace, like hurricane burning the end tips of my fingers, the rainbow opening a way for the leprechaun to fake fame, the voice of love, the voice of forgiveness. He may not appear with a white bloody unicorn, but he appears in studs, and with a golden cape and a crimson colored rose, I always thought roses should considerably be marked hypocritical, as it posses the petals of different shades, falling apart in the end.

So I said the word I always wanted to say as a little Alice in the Wonderland, in spirals I walk around the walk, but in the end, it’s a pair of invisible red flippers under these platform and high heels, I am walking in spirals, I am walking the live of Dorothy where in the end everybody gets what they needed, they get the shit they own from the beginning, whereas they never really realized the shades of it, the shades that lies between their insecurities, and I found mine, I found love and it glimmers better in the dark.

They talk like my heartbeat of my past when I come and open up, whereas the one I love is no longer visible, wrapped in the golden auburn horns, where I can never leave my innocence behind, but I can always change her onto me, I am finally the inner beast he brought out, I am finally the starring role of this game, I am a starring role of the dark, and believe me, it’s sometimes a lot better, I am just another girl, hit down the ground to make a change through my shadows, through these thick eyeliner I can only smirk ad blink with to look beautiful, even in my ceremony, and the attendant who I thought was the innocent Mickey Mouse, ended up to be the handler who was hiding this whole time, controlling my acts, and he holds the ceremonial with the hourglass symbol, from dirty, crimson, liquid, swelling through the writer’s nose.

I finally become the lady I’ve always looked up to, I became more of myself, the me I haven’t really met in the past few centuries in my past lives, I believe this was meant to be. I am masked, but visible, I am the creature I became earlier and more now, slowly I put my hands on his, and we closed the part of our eyes which is a medium for our handlers, the eye we see, the eye we know, which is hidden, we are bending our personas onto one, and I know where Dorothy ends up in the end, she ends up masked on her home, and as for me, I am bending my persona with him, we are finally one in two different bodies. And the staring dolls hold my sad innocence, because no one is going to take my soul away, because nobody really sold it, but in the end, I am not a product, I am a controller, I am the lost innocent because I am more of myself then.  I am the part of me I can never really be apart from, I am Ray Kellia Rhodensoma.

PhotoVogue Features:

Marry The Night

Party

THE PHOTOGRAPHIC SENSE

PAR.Reinhardt Kenneth

Models. Rania Putri Sari,Evan Darius Effendi @Red Models,Lukas Atmaja @Lookgraphy,Kelby Immanuel Rusli, Fajar Adi Sulaksono&Crew@Inter Models

Stylist.Nadya Joy

MUA and Videography.Larasati @Lara Photography, Valencia Yong

Hairstylist.Valencia Yong

Wardrobe.Diana Couture

Interior.Theresia The

Lighting Director.Lukas Atmaja @Lookgraphy

Jewelry.BarQco

Headpieces.Dawi&Chris

This will be THE PHOTOGRAPHIC SENSE's last post of the year, bloody unicorns, thank you so much for always having my back, for always being such a doll to my crimson heart, for all your art and your support, and for everything else, thank you so much,2012 had been a blessing towards my heart, see you very soon in 2013, in 2013, there will be no more lazy blogging, kunts! So, I know everyone else mostly is posting countdowns of the bests of 2012, I decided to post this because, this is the past part of me I want to expose currently, and I usually just end up getting bored on my old stuff, so enjoy it while you can, we were born for art!.HAPPY NEW YEAR, don't ever regret, a friend of mine said, that everything you own, will end up owning you in the end, thats what Jamie said. GOD BLESS YOU. xo