This image belongs to the photographic work 'Double Think', a project that creates an intersection between the notion of 'double think' as posited by the English novelist George Orwell in the novel 'Nineteen Eighty Four' (1949) and the Manifesto of the Cultural revolution (1966-1976) by the Chinese revolutionary Chairman Mao Zedong, through the language of fashion photography. In this sense, this photographic project aims to give evidence to the paradoxes of contemporary society, between east and west societies through the power that fashion photography can have away from the mainstream. On the one hand, the project draws onto a series of literary fiction citations to address a different story and a different rhetoric through the constructions of visual metaphors. On the other hand, the project questions the impact of political propaganda, particularly the choice of telling or not telling the truth in relation to matters of fact. In this sense, this photographic project compares two different philosophical backgrounds through the frames of photographic conceptual operations.
The project comprises a series of fashion photography images. In particular, each image presents a different pose and in so doing, it revisits and turns the representation of the ideal man/woman according to Mao Zedong's Manifesto of the Cultural Chinese Revolution. Another significant element is the choice of photographing a female figure as a Mother Earth portrayed in a countryside location but standing as a modern Frida Khalo. This is a reinterpretation of Mao Zedong's propaganda messages about leaving urban contexts and moving back to the countryside to support the country's production and development. Fashion photography, in this sense, aims to empower contemporary women by suggesting aesthetic and political meanings.
'Double Think' raises questions about social contradictions and enigmas, addressing questions about Eastern and Western cultures, gender issues, politics and philosophy through the force of fashion photography.