Loretta Lux at NGV

Loretta Lux's photograph The Drummer (2004) is currently part of the NGV's Confounding Contemporary Photography exhibition. At first glance it looks like an image of a porcelain doll and a tin drum, and it has an eerie feel that very realistic dolls often have, as if there is more to them than what is initially perceived. However, the photograph is actually of a young boy in a canvas shirt playing a tin drum. He appears frozen in time midway through the motion of hitting the drum. To get this highly surreal effect, Lux takes a photograph of the figure (the boy and drum) and then combines it with a painted backdrop, then finally digitally works the image to flawlessly meld the two images, creating a sense of hyper-reality.

Loretta Lux. The Drummer (2004)

It is a disconcerting image that looks at the seeming fragility of children, or rather a child's view of the world.