Monthly Featured Photographer - April 2015

Chloé says -
It's really great having come to the south of France to retire and with Harem being in the UK most of the time with his wife there gives me a great deal of freedom to make my life independently when he's not around.

Of course when he's not here he thinks I'm a good little girl tucked up in bed . . . and he doesn't give me enough money to go shopping, telling me that there's plenty of good food I can salvage thrown in the bins by the supermarket on the other side of the road. Fancy expecting me to have to suffer the indignity of going down the bins! So a girl's got to earn some money somehow.

Luckily I have quite a fan club round here and make friends where-ever I go so getting work isn't difficult. Sometimes I help out at the restaurant at the beach behind the bar, sometimes at the supermarket checkout, and more recently I've got jobs tuning pianos at local villas and more recently working with the local estate agent charming clients looking around fancy villas.

A few weeks ago I had an assignment to view a villa in a posh place on the French Riviera. Oh WOW! It bowled me flat coming from Harem's one room apartment in Antibes. The agent got me to take round a special client and to have my photo taken there, and I loved the grotto and the secret door into the library, that magnificent staircase, and the secret door in the alcove with the urn. The walls of the print room with the mirror were amazing with architectural drawings of all the classical and masonic inspiration to the design of the house and I really wanted more time to explore the 10 hectares of grounds.

I really fancied living there so just as I go shopping for fruit juice at the Casino shop where I work, as we went through Juan les Pins I thought I could that night I thought I could go shopping for enough money to buy it. So I got Harem to drop me off at the bar opposite where I hoped I'd be able to seduce a rich man, but found only youngsters there, and then went to the Casino opposite.

Oh dear. I can't say more than that. I lost it all, trying all night there and got home in the morning without sleep having to beg Harem's croissant.

Harem wasn't very impressed and told me that this fast life wasn't good for a doll so I went out piano tuning in the afternoon, enjoying relaxing a bit by the pool.

Seeing the statue I tried practicing some classical pose of seduction, but Harem's right - working too hard can lead one to fall flat.

It was certainly an exhausting couple of days but our maker knows how to make us well . . .

~ Chloé

Harem says -

How lucky I was for Chloé to decide to come to have fun with me.

This photoshoot happened by accident and was a direct result of the strange outlook by which I perceive and live life.

Trained as a quantum physicist I operate living based upon probabilities and the results of interactions. As a process I see a pattern of behaviour, throughout all matter from subatomic particles and atoms and molecules and proteins and DNA and genes, through to us, planets, galaxies and the universe. This pattern of action is all powerful, is both result and cause of everything, invisible, everywhere and, by linking all in interaction is an intelligence.

This approach sees everything that cooperates resulting in the creation of things more useful than their individual parts and creating new levels of sophistication.

The result of this approach means that I have to be aware of what other people are doing and of how it's possible to work together to make circumstances do something new and good. So I talk to everyone and try to link all together in attempts to find the best result. But failure often results and one has to accept that.

Taking these photos was a challenge. Moving Chloé and manipulating her from place to place, shot to shot and helping her to feel natural takes time. Mid afternoon light is great . . . but the limited hours require fast working. A good friend came with me and helped, not quite understanding how important it is for a doll to be placed very gently on her feet, so Chloé found that she had cuts on her heels at the end of the day and couldn't go bathing in the pool . . . But silicone dolls are easily repaired and this won't be a problem.

Doing the shot outside the villa gates was fun. It was the last shot of the day with many cars passing during the beginning of rush hour. Seeing me with Chloé on the ground manipulating her from a sitting position to standing, with her on the ground a passing car stopped and the driver was on the point of calling an ambulance thinking that a live lady had fainted!

Manipulating her in and out of the back seat of a Fiat 500 was . . . fun. Not surprising for us to end up with aching arms! Even though she is only 26kgs, my friend complained that although he thought he was fit, his arm ached despite him being used to carrying his 45kg girlfriend for fun from time to time.

At the Casino in Juan, a girl from the bar opposite saw me getting Chloé to stand against the railing and came over to ask if I'd like help to do the photo, and whether I'd like a photo of me with Chloé! I think that stopping the small car on the pavement nearby and getting Chloé out, manipulating her and carrying her to position had been a source of entertainment . . . And Chloé has such a friendly expression on her face, she invites all to join in her fun.

I simply explain that I write stories with these photos about her and people ask me if I have a blog . . . to which I tell people to Google "Chloé - A day in the life of a doll - French Riviera"

Tuning the piano the next day for a concert, the lady who lives there asked me about Chloé having heard about her from her Philipino maid to whom I had chatted at a bus stop in the Autumn. So Chloé was summoned to the villa for a photo session. The lady at the villa has worked professionally in the theatre for decades and so regards Chloé as art, of photography, mime and performance, and in that is the fun.

There are few other makes of dolls that I could really work with in this way requiring speed and manoeuvrability. To have found a doll who can stand on her own two feet, has a skeleton sophisticated enough to adopt natural positions, even as though walking in some shots, not requiring cranes to lift, wheelchairs to move nor stands to pose, and can fall over sometimes without damage, has been magic and the very source of inspiration.

To put this with a doll with a face that's friendly, on the point of coming alive and inviting fun has been a great privilege to enjoy and with which to share fun with so many.

~ haremlover