Impact

DREAMS AS FLIGHTS OF SOUL

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Storyteller.”

KIRSTY MITCHELL

Are dreams images that your soul makes? Are they conjured by stirrings deep within?

Sometimes our souls soar into a dream. Sometime we gently drift. Sometime real life is so hard, it forces us to dream… like it did for Kirsty Mitchell.

British photographer Kirsty Mitchell pours her soul out in her dreamlike photos. After her mother died of brain cancer, in 2008, Mitchell expressed her inner yearnings, fears, and curiosities through Wonderland, a series of surreal photo-compositions.

“That was when photography engulfed me, becoming an overwhelming passion that I could not stop,” says Mitchell.

Ideas for her images came from childhood memories, stories her mother told her, connections to her mother’s own soul.

“Photography became my only escape when I could no longer talk about how I felt. It became an utter fantasy that blocked out the real world, and a place where I could return to my memories of her, far away from those hospitals walls,” explains Mitchell.

Mitchell had a successful career in the fashion design world. She began work at the design studios of Alexander McQueen and Hussein Chalayan, both of whom have deeply influenced her work.

Woman wearing fairy wings walks through a meadow filled with purple flowers.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “Euphaeidae.”

Mitchell’s love for fashion and costume design comes through bright and clear. She creates images in which she had a hand in designing and making every costume, set element, and prop.

Blonde woman wearing a long cape and hat made of yellow autumn leaves walks along a forest path.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Guidance of Stray Souls.”

Mitchell acts out her dreams.

“Since embarking on this path, I have walked on snow covered in flowers, stood in lakes at sunset, painted trees, set fire to chairs, made smoking umbrellas, and giant wigs from stolen flowers,” she shares.

Woman wearing a yellow ruffled gown with a long train walks next to a yellow sailboat and meadow filled with yellow flowers.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “Gaia’s Spell.”

While dreams are fleeting, Mitchell’s Wonderland series took three years to complete. Some images took as much as 5 months to produce.

When Mitchell envisioned the intense color of bluebells, in bloom only a brief few weeks per year, she waited a full 12 months so she could shoot costumes to match their color.

Redheaded woman wearing a purple dress and gloves holds a book as she stands in the middle of purple hydrangea bushes.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Secret Garden.”

“All the characters came to me in my dreams,” Mitchell explains.

Mitchell has collaborated with FX Media, who helped to shoot a mini series about all of the incredible effort that goes into Kirsty’s work, including a behind-the-scenes clips detailing the preparation for each image, all of which, you can find below.

Woman wearing a ruffled gown, in pink, lavender and purple, carries a purple feathered parasol as she walks through a field of lavender flowers.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Lavender Princess.”

There are currently four films in the series:

The Stars of Spring will Carry you Home
The Secret Locked in the Roots of a Kingdom
She’ll Wait for You in the Shadows of Summer
Gaia, the Birth of an End

Woman with very long blond hair stands in the middle of a lily pond.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “Lady of the Lake.”

Mitchell has recently exhibited with Italian Vogue and was recently made Nikon UK’s Ambassador of Fine Art Photography.

Learn more about her work via her website and get info on limited edition prints here.

Blonde haired woman sits in the woods with an old book and toy sailing ship.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “An Ocean of Tales Until the Shores of Home.”

Woman wearing a black flowered kimono carries a flowered parasol as she walks along a pink path through the snow. Photo by Kirsty Mitchell.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “Spirited Away.”

Woman wearing a long purple ruffled gown with a long train, carries a bunch of purple and black balloons as she walks along a tree-lined path. Photo by Kirsty Mitchell.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “In Celebration of Spring.”

Woman laying on a bed of purple grass and flowers.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “A Listless Dawn.”

Read more about Summer Dreams all this week on BeautifulNow. And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Wellness, Impact, Nature/Science, Food, Arts/Design, and Travel, Daily Fix posts.

Woman in retro hairstyle and ruffled gown poses in the forest. Photo by Kirsty Mitchell.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Patience of Trees.”

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Woman in an Alice in Wonderland fantasy costume holds purple flowers standing in a cloud of purple smoke in a topiary garden. Photo by Kirsty Mitchell.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Garden of Whispered Wishes.”

Woman dressed up as a “Candy Cane Witch.” Photo by Kirsty Mitchell.

Photo: by Kirsty Mitchell. “The Candy Cane Witch.”