‘Anna Gaskell is an American art photographer and artist from Des Moines, Iowa. She is best known for her photographic series that she calls “elliptical narratives” which are similar to the works produced by Cindy Sherman.‘

Anna Gaskell (born October 22, 1969) is an American art photographer and artist from Des Moines, Iowa.

Known for her haunting depictions of young women in ambiguous scenes, Anna Gaskell began casting girls—specifically identical twins—to reinterpret scenarios from Alice in Wonderland. As the Serpent is from a series of photographs that shows the girls in close-up, extracted from the bright backgrounds that mark her other photographs related to this theme. Here, we see Gaskell’s model facing forward, yet the work’s title suggests that she is not posed as herself but is rather playing a role, namely the serpent of the image’s title. Discussing her interest in the Alice books, Gaskell suggests a enigmatic connection between their author Charles Dodgson (whose pseudonym was Lewis Carroll) and his inspiration, a young girl named Alice Liddell. Their relationship was “so complicated and mysterious,” Gaskell stated. “We don’t really know anything about it, but we know enough. There is the possibility of child abuse. His longing for her. I like the danger about it—at some point, being unable to explain it. I like the world that she lived in.”

Gaskell focuses on re telling traditional fairy tales and childhood stories through photography often capturing the story’s in a violent and disturbing light, when drawing inspiration from Gaskell I am most interested in her ability to create narratives through still photography and capture the essence of a story.

Book layout

Anna Gaskell does not only use photography to contribute to her story telling she also utilised simple drawings to chapter her images which I intend to imitate in my own work