Barbara Neill-Bottle began taking photographs, like her inspiration Victorian photographer Julia Margaret Cameron, when she was 48 years old. “I wanted to try photography for myself, as a way of illustrating my poems and short stories.”
Barbara’s images are more than just an illustration of her words. The stunning ‘Lifecast’ shows life caster, CJ Munn, lying, half asleep in stretched out pleasure, surrounded by the casts of the naked forms that she makes for her clients. Sprinkled in plaster dust Barbara has made the artist become the art. With a tenderness and eroticism a cast arm holds the naked form and delves between CJ’s legs as if the art is seeking a way back into the womb of its’ own creation. Barbara tells me “I had to work quickly, so I was running up and down a ladder like a mad thing, re-arranging the casts to provide a sense of balance etc. It was great fun to do, though, and I have always been pleased with the results.” ‘Lifecast’ was featured in the Art Undressed exhibition in 2008.
Often inspired by music the poem ‘Instinct’ was inspired by another cast, painted to imitate a Fender Jazz bass guitar, that CJ made of Barbara’s torso, “I find music very sensual and evocative and have also contemplated comparisons made between musical instruments and naked bodies.” Whether her words follow the art or the art follows the words matters not, Barbara’s tender treatment of the naked form is touching, the vintage feel of ‘Fallen Angel (female)’ or the delectable male bottom of ‘Rearview’ the images make you want to reach out and smooth the skin in front of you which is unsurprising perhaps when you discover that Barbara is also a qualified holistic massage therapist.
Currently working on a totally new project artistically Barbara tells me “If all goes according to plan, I’ll be providing some stories and poems to be read at The Night of the Senses 2010 in a rather unusual way!” The event, once known as the Sex Maniacs Ball, raises funds for the charity, Outsiders, who provide support to the isolated disabled in finding friendship and partnership.
Working within the Erotic art community has also brought Barbara into contact with www.eroticsignature.com a website that promotes the best of erotic art and also brings together those with similar inspirations. ES publishes a yearly volume entitled ‘The Worlds’ Greatest Erotic Art of Today’. “I’ve found the Erotic Signature community to be a great place to show my pictures and some of my writing to get useful feedback. It’s a very supportive community in which we also offer each other inspiration and friendship.”
If you would like to explore some more of Barbara’s work you can do so here www.barbaraneill-bottle.com.
CJ Munn’s work can be seen and ordered here www.rockabelly.co.uk
Information about the London based the ‘Night of the Senses’ ball can be found here www.nightofthesenses.com and the charity Outsiders here www.outsiders.org.uk
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