‘The Ascent’ ©Robert Sky Bradshaw

Slipping Halos is Robert Sky Brandon’s personal vision of heaven, where the American photographer explores what might happen to those who are mistakenly welcomed to His kingdom. In the pictures, heaven is a similar place than our homes here on Earth; with the only difference that everything is covered in white. However, through the series the rooms become progressively tarnished. Red objects make their appearance, for sin follows the ones that do not belong in heaven, and it ultimately surrounds them completely, creating their own personal hell “in the midst of everyone else’s heaven.”

For each picture, Brandon creates a miniature set, which he then proceeds to photograph using the technique of Light Painting (also called Light Writing). The rooms he builds are highly unstable, and between fixing the sets and coming up with the correct light exposure, his shoots can take up to 40 hours.  The end results are images that feel both very familiar and surreal at the same time: they are a promise of rest and peace waiting on the other side, yet they remind the viewers that in this world or the next, “hell could be just a door away.”

-Elena Kendall

              

                        ’Abandon Hope All Who…’ ©Robert Sky Bradshaw