Review: Prisoner of Conscience - Lena Semenkova Feature

by NDK Creative Artist

Psychobitchua didn’t want to talk about this particular image, but I do because like The Kingdom the image says a lot about her talent as a visual artist. The model in the picture was originally nearly nude, artfully draped with beads and pearls and ‘precious’ metals that had her looking as if she was fresh from a sheik’s sandy desert home where clothes are only needed to keep the body from losing moisture.

 

Our featured artist has so skilfully adjusted this image that you’re overwhelmed by the first impression. This is a stunning piece of work, displaying Lena’s immense talent and ability to create illusion. Study this picture and you’ll begin to see how Psychobitchua has artfully employed her skill and our mind’s wish to see what it thinks it sees to work for this image. Truly, Prisoner of Conscience is an astounding homage to one of her great inspirations, Johnny Depp.

But what’s it saying? A woman in piratic garb is on all fours, kneeling, perhaps on the rocks of a seashore we cannot see, and which for all we know maybe some isolated patch of rocky reef far from land. She is surrounded by the endless swells of the ocean. Her head is thrown back and up, in an almost wanton pose, as if she seeks to allure, but not quite. There is something fake here. The title is an intriguing one, and it took me a while to figure this one out to at least my satisfaction, and I’m only partially satisfied, I assure you.

This female pirate is a prisoner. Yes, she is chained and shackled to the reef by a metal stake which is driven into it. But where is her conscience? And what does her conscience have to do with this image? Is she shackled to her sexuality, to her gender? A pirate trapped in a woman’s body? Is this beautiful, wanton pirate the prisoner, or are we?

There are no more clues in this picture; only questions that endlessly engage and that is what art is all about.

Art engages the viewer in an endless story, never providing all the answers, but stimulating the imagination to participate in its own stories.

The secret of the Prisoner of Conscience may never be revealed, it may remain locked up in Lena’s (or our) beautiful mind forever, and perhaps that’s the best place for it to be, so that we are always engaged in creating our own stories, with our own conscience.

Feature Index

1. Lena Semenkova - Camouflage of Contradictions
2. Digital Art and Photomanipulation
3. Review: The Imitator
4. Review: The Waiting
5. Review: Superstar
6. Interview Part 1
7. Review: The Kingdom
8. Review: Like a Bird
9. Interview Part 2
10. Review: Ghost Rider
11. Review: All the snowflakes must die
12. Interview Part 3
13. Review: Red Skull
14. Review: Prisoner of Conscience
15. Review: War
16. Conclusion

Check back frequently or subscribe - much more to come!

Where do we go now?

If you can't wait for more, explore the archives sorted by month via the links in the right-hand sidebar, or use the Category links in the same place.

If you'd rather we did all the hard work, you're in luck. Here's a list of articles that are related to this one:

• Review: Like a Bird - Lena Semenkova Feature
• Review: Superstar - Lena Semenkova Feature
• Lena Semenkova - Camouflage of Contradictions
• Review: Red Skull - Lena Semenkova Feature
• Review: Ghost Rider - Lena Semenkova Feature