Exhibition Essay

PhotoAccess Exhibition

"Dragon Airways" by Josh Dykraaf 

This image appears in the PhotoAcess exhibition at the Manuka Arts Center, in Manuka. The artist is Josh Dykraaf and the piece is entitled “Dragon Airways”.

The exhibition is made up of local photographers and has some extremely good and interesting images within it. The show has no real theme running through it but small areas where one artist has three or four pieces all of the one theme in it. The show has a varied amount of talent, some pieces make you stand in awe of it and some piece you feel shouldn't really be up among some of the better pieces.

This piece by Josh Dykraaf is really interesting because it is not just a photograph but is an extremely good photo manipulation. The piece to me shows a great imagination on the artists behalf and great patience. The artist has turned a simple plan into a dragon and to do this it would have taken a huge amount of concentration and patience. All of the images that Dykraaf has used to construct the bigger picture was taken by him so there is no issue of using stock images.

I really love the small bits of detail that Dykraaf has included; the second airplane or 'dragon' shows some context and that this is not just a one of case of 'Dragon Airways'. Also the little bits of luggage which help to continue the tail but for me add a little bit of humor to the image. How many times have people lost their luggage during a flight!? 

I also really love the composition of the image. The artist has used the rule of thirds quite effectively in this image, it places the focus on the first plane. I also really like how the artist has created the sense of direction in the image, i can tell that the plane is going through the image and not just stationary.

The artist has really effectively created the illusion of the dragon, he has competently changed the planes so that they are just not a collection of planes but a dragon.

i find this piece to be really effective and quite a good use of the artists imagination. The degree of skill that it would have taken the artist is quite high and makes me appreciate him and his work that much more.

Image found at: http://dahoota.deviantart.com/#/d3bd0jr

More of his work can be found here: http://dahoota.deviantart.com/

"Red Light Crusier" Josh Dykraaf

"Toruble in Big Book City" Josh Dykraaf