Alana O’Herlihy is an artist unlike other. Wigs, glitter, dick-shaped candles and fake blood... You name it, she has used it. With her humorous and sharp perspective Alana O'Herlihy brings fashion photography a much-needed originality.
Alana doesn't limit herself with a certain direction. You can catch her taking self-portraits of herself as Jack Nicholson and see her directing a kick-ass music video the next day. (The music video in question is Prisoner by Miley Cyrus and Dua Lipa, the one that we have all replayed at least a dozen of times.) She has a wide-varied skill set that she can apply to any given platform whether it be a video, a collage or a photograph. Her works share a similar aesthetic however each piece that she creates has something completely unique. In a time where most fashion photographers or artists know what they can do best and stick to it until the day they die, Alana brings the excitement element back in the game. Despite her young age, she has proven herself to be one of the best artists of our time and has been featured in almost every huge magazine. Vogue, L'officiel, Pitchfork, Garage, Mission... Once again, you name it, she was in it.
Source: https://www.alanaoherlihy.com
Her unfiltered perspective makes us feel like we are there with Alana. She doesn't make those glamorous backstage pictures look overwhelmingly unrealistic, quite the contrary. She gives us an intimate sneak peak behind the close doors of the fashion industry and we get to observe the scene for ourselves. Just take a look at these backstage photos she took of Bella Hadid. It makes me think of the times where we played dress-up with with my friends, developed our films that we took that night and made collages of them. As she has a deep-rooted friendship with the Hadid sisters, she captures them on a level where no other photographer can. There is always a sense of a sweet long-lasting friendship that radiates through the photographs. With her perspective, Alana turns those big names that seem unreachable to us into people like us, just being captured in genuine moments.
“It only inspires me when it’s a person in front of the lens,” Alana O’Herlihy says for cool.com , “because I can feel the emotion and…other things don’t really excite me at all. Humans are interesting. Humans are complicated; and I like capturing that.”
She mixes nostalgic features with off-beat ethereal themes. To attain this contrast, she uses the power of makeup quite often. With her work we see that from her self-portraits to her photoshoots, the makeup plays a transforming role where each person turns into a character coming alive from Alana's imagination. She creates a story of its own with her art. It's almost like looking at an artwork where you get stuck in front of, trying to decode the meaning behind it. It could mean anything. It's impossible to pinpoint her inspiration as observation is second nature to her, it could be coming from anywhere.
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