In advertising, when attempting to come up with a fresh idea or execution, it is often said "it's been done". The same can hold true of many art related disciplines and clearly the juxtaposition of miniature figurines with ordinary objects has proved to be but one of the concepts often executed.
Here are just four (and there are more) artists/photographers who have created visual narratives by placing tiny human figurines with ordinary and mundane items.
1. Baktana by Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow are artists/industrial designers who combined their talents in 1996 to form an Israeli-based design studio located in South Tel Aviv. They collaborate on everything from lighting design and furniture to medical products and dinnerware (you may have seen their "hotplates" on designboom).
One of their lesser known projects, Baktana, is a series of miniature figurines juxtaposed with found objects, creating little narratives. I just love them, so I wanted to share them with you. The tiny monochrome figurines are those often used in architectural models or with model trains. By placing them in and around such mundane objects as pencil sharpeners, wire brushes and keys, they create stories of their own.
All these itty bitty set-ups fit one one table:
See more of their work and projects here.
2. Vincent Bousserez Plastic Life
Another artist who creates narratives by combining miniature figurines with found objects is talented photographer Vincent Bousserez and his Plastic Life Series. Coincidentally, he even uses some of the same objects, like the brush:
A few more images from Vincent's Plastic life series:
He has an enormous amount of images in this series, and you can see them all here.
3. Jason Barnhart
San Francisco photographer Jason Barnhart has also shot a series of HO scale figurines with found objects- or in many of his images, food. You won't find these images on his site but he contributed them to JPG magazine under the name CultureSpy:
See more of Jason's miniature images here.
4. Slinkachu
An anonymous street artist who goes by the name of Slinkachu, has a series named "Little People Left In The City To Fend For Themselves." What make his or her work slightly different than the others is that the series is a street art installation, placing these out in the world, as opposed to being created in a studio. The images below show the narratives as close-ups and then as they are seen in the environments.
in situ:
in situ:
in situ:
in situ:
in situ:
See more work by Slinkachu here.
And there you have it, four talents with the same big idea of tiny people.