Lucy in the Sky

I’ve had a lot of trouble with Lucy. Not that I know what her real name is, but she reminds me of my great-aunt Lucy who was still mountain climbing well into her seventies. This Lucy must have been a feisty one too because she dug in her heels and wouldn’t let me alter her until I began listening to her. So as usual, it was what I took out that allowed me to finish Lucy, not what I was trying to put in.
One of the challenges of working with an image like this is wondering why anyone would part with it in the first place. Posing for a photographer was obviously a special occasion for Lucy. She’s wearing a lovely dress with a watch pinned to her bodice. Her hair is glossy and poufed…the expression on her face sweetly serene. When this picture was taken, Lucy was a real person with real thoughts and feelings. But somehow along the way she became anonymous. My task was to give her a new identity, and I hope she’s happy with what I did.