Alana Barrell is not a typical artist. She has a mind like no other and the beautiful paintings she creates are an expression of her unique outlook on life. It’s in part due to being raised in South Africa, Singapore, Ethiopia, and Brunei throughout her childhood, but it’s in part due to the fact that she lives with schizophrenia.

I think my new favourite saying is, “There’s magic in chaos” and nothing could describe this shoot more accurately. For those who don’t know me, I like to plan out every possible detail of a photoshoot. That being said, when I’ve worked with someone as long as I have with Christelle Souverbie, I like to go with the flow and see where the wind takes us.

I’ve always wanted to play with black light because of the intensity of the neons that can be created. I wanted to make sure I could do it in a sophisticated way because it can so easily go trashy. Don’t get me wrong, I love trashy but I knew that black light could be so much more if carefully used.

There are a few photoshoot concepts that I cannot get enough of and gold body paint is one of them. The story behind this shoot was to create a golden goddess from a different time and I think we accomplished it!

Creative body-paint cosplay photoshoot in Old Montreal. This is what happens when a client trusts their photographer.