“East of the Sun and West of the Moon” – “The Red Shoes”
Ok, so I guess these images are like my children. Or books, or movies, or composers. I really don’t have a favorite. But I do LOVE this image. Jasmyne was my model for this. She is a senior company dancer with Ballet Arts and was in the middle of rehearsals for “The Nutcracker”, in which she portrayed the Snow Queen. I had already talked with her about being my model for this image, but she was not prepared for my call one dark winter afternoon at about 5:00, asking if she could meet me downtown NOW before it got dark! I told her we would be taking the pictures in the cemetery, a change of plan. I had already driven past Ridgecrest Cemetery, the oldest cemetery in Jackson, twice that day while shuttling my kids to school and back. (I love the stone gate at the entrance, which says “Here Sleep the Founders of Jackson”). I had noticed how beautiful the snow was there, piling up around the old gravestones, and I suddenly had the idea to try to get the Red Shoes image done before the snow went away.
So during her dinner break from rehearsal, Jasmyne met me at my studio and I gave her a black dress to wear. We went to the cemetery and she put her pointe shoes on in the car. (No they weren’t actually red – she didn’t have a red pair handy! The famous Red Shoes were the only thing I added to this picture in post-processing.) By the time we got there the sun had already set and it was blowing snow like crazy. Jasmyne was great, never even said she was cold even though I knew she was freezing! It was almost dark when I took this picture. Yay for fast lenses and wonderful dancers!
This story has always fascinated me. Many of you may have seen one of several movie versions of this creepy, instructive tale about how children should not be greedy and want for material things. CREEPY. Luckily I was not moved to illustrate the part of this story where the dancer’s feet have to be cut off so that she can stop dancing. Wow, children’s literature has changed.
On a brighter note, Jasmyne even made it back to rehearsal on time!
