When two creatives, paper artist Pauline Loctin and photographer William Ukoh, decided to put their heads together and collaborate on a project, sparks and creatives juices flew and we’re enjoying the fruits of their labor. Their intriguingly titled UFUK ISO project, which translates as “face covering”, examines the idea of “masks” we either choose or are forced to wear in our daily lives, with a captivating series of photographs taken by Ukoh that showcase models wearing paper headdresses and masks made by Loctin.
In a world based on appearances, we tend to mask ourselves, our experiences and our feelings, in order to fit into the prescribed societal mold – to belong to a community.
Pondering the masks we wear in our daily lives – be it online, or in the real world
Montreal-based Pauline Loctin is a French paper artist with roots in French Algeria, who creates wonderful paper artworks inspired by her travels and important societal and ecological issues. Loctin explores all aspects, possibilities, and techniques working with paper offers, by painting, folding, crumpling, sticking it – creating visual experiences that either disrupt the status quo or interacts or intersects with their environment in a surprising way.
William Ukoh, a successful and massively talented photographer who is known for his well-composed portraits that bring together influences of African and Renaissance painting as well as African American culture. Ukoh has created a recognizable aesthetic world in which humans become symbols, women are honored with grace, and colors ignite deep emotion.
In the Ufuk Iso project, the two creatives, who work deeply in the visual world where aesthetics are not only considered as the appreciation of beauty but as a personal view or stylistic world one creates, ponder the meaning and implications of the masks we all wear. “In a world based on appearances, we tend to mask ourselves, our experiences and our feelings, in order to fit into the prescribed societal mold – to belong to a community”, the pair writes. Enjoy the full photo series below, and make sure to follow both Pauline Loctin and William Ukoh on Instagram for for inspiration.
Art direction: William Ukoh & Pauline Loctin
Photographer: William Ukoh
Paper art: Pauline Loctin
Models: @SSSSSECONDSIGHT, @ATLASHAPY
Stylist: Haji Maa
Assistant: Julien Herger, Anne Marie Munoz
