Art Photography With Dolls.....

Hi, All....

From years 2005-2014, I photographed dolls and told stories....Stories that are children's book. The dolls were my muses and told me what to write......These are Himstedt dolls.....and each doll is over 30" mostly...heavy dolls and life sized.
I dressed them all for all of my stories, as most wore children's size 1-2 sized clothing, so I collected buckets and buckets of clothes along the way, also.......I have a tub or two or three...lol...left of my favorite things...., but have gifted much of the clothes to my neighbor' little girl and Stan's little neice...... I used to lug these dolls around around everywhere to illustrate the stories I had in mind....I do not have many of these dolls anymore....

I am not going to write each story here, but will give the titles of the stories I wrote and a sample or two of each story.....I have thousands of photos, such as these......hundreds of stories, so this will take some time to share here just samplings.....

These are photos up to 2008 only....from my last house and that era...i have not even picked photos from my era in this house yet....It takes time....I have been reliving many memories, as I go....so this thread with be continuing.....and i will start it today ....

Annette Himstedt is an unmatched doll artist in her field...... she stopped making these works of art in 2011 or so.......I used to belong to a forum that celebrated her dolls mainly....but after she stopped making dolls.....the forum sort of died, as well.....I would put a new story there and photos almost every week after hours and hours and sometimes days of work....for free.........many photos for each story...I did this for 8 years for the love of it and the fun I would have doing it..... I would buy the dolls, sell them, to buy another.....and so on...i have very few of these dolls left now......and do not take photos of dolls anymore for story telling.....



Newport Rhode Island.....We are on vacation!



The Lemonade Stand....IN Ri, still, with same doll.....Her dress has little lemons all over it.....




Day on the Beach....with same doll in RI..."I will take care of you, my turtle friend..."




Sand Dollar dreams....with same doll in RI...her name given by Annette is Lillemore. I do not have her, anymore....

 

Fun at the Beach with Lillemore still in RI...




"Hi, everyone! I hoped you are enjoying my postcards from Rhode Island...."




"Wish you were here....!"...still with Liillemore IN RI. This was a major story with many photos.....We were really in Newport, RI.





Color Me Pretty! With katiina, Annette's Finnish doll...i do not have her anymore.



White Tigers in the snow....

 

Chinese New Year
In real life, it was going to be the year of the tiger.......This is Shillin. I don't have her anymore, either. She is one of Annette's Asian sculpts. She was with the white tiger in the last post......

Year of the Tiger




"Is life a fortune cookie?"....(These dolls were close to 40" tall, some times, as this one was. They have real glass eyes)



Teacher's pet......an apple a day...

This is Tamlyn, another of Annette's Asian sculpts....She would make 50-150 of each sculpt, so these dolls are very limited....and since each is hand painted...many of the same sculpt would look different...or how their eyes were placed, etc.......My Tamlyn is slightly different than yours....etc
I traded my Tamlyn for a rarer doll I wanted from a friend of mine in texas, that was not a Himstedt.....and she wanted my Tamlyn, after visiting me and seeing her........and a year later, she sent my Tamlyn back to me as a Christmas gift, as she said in her card to me...that this Tamlyn really needed to be with me.......This is a $1,000 doll...so I will always have her, and she is with me, still..a treasure...a generous gift, indeed, from someone who has every Himstedt doll Annette ever made. She has a mansion museum...and there are many different sculpts.....a few hundred different ones.....This doll is a treasure...and such a special gift from someone who thinks alot of me....and I of her. She just lost her husband to cancer last year.




Is Rudolph here?

An Eskimo doll by Annette, who I do not have anymore.......
I took this photo at a neighbor's Christmas Light spread ..i don't put displays such as this up ever....




"I will comfort you"....twin sister sculpts....Natalie and Becki...I sold Becki, the blonde one with the mohair hair and kept redhead, Natalie. She is a smaller 28" sculpt.

 

Happy Birthday to me....

and it really was, so i celebrated part of the day with many photos and a story about a birthday party ..Lillemore again celebrating her birthday, too.....I do not have any of these dolls anymore.....and those are 2 of Annette's smaller sculpts....



"You are trying to take my wish away!"
"Ok, I will let you have my wish...."




"Oh, I love my gift , and it matches my dress!"

This was a gift to me in real life from Build a bear...i don't have that anymore, either.....shame on me...LOL



Prince Charming....

"No, I do not go fox hunting..."
I sold him, too....;(




"My own zoo!"

Shillin again....



"Am I George Washington's great great great grandaughter?"

lol

becki again



"On the count of 3, let's all pout"

lol

Do not have these two anymore...

 

She wore flowers in her hair

Anna Lu.....yet another Asian Sculpt of Annette's....She was the sweetest, and i sold her, too....



Tales from Africa.....Ayoka also got sold....



Apricot Dreams

Anna Lu, again.



"Little Bird, I will take care of you...."

Trinchen...sold.....They were too expensive for me to keep...I would have kept this one....
My dolls were my props for story telling and photography....basically...




"Ok, I don't fit in..."

Monja on your far left, who I do still have and the 3 Asian sculpts by Annette.....
I do have Monja....i was known for my Monja....apparently, one of the most beautiful Monja's....She was in many , many stories of mine.......and I identified with her so much......At my last forum, if they thought of me, they thought of Monja, so Monja is still with me...



Alma.....

Violets......

I do not have Alma, anymore...one who was one of my favorites for a very long time...

 

I've had a fear of dolls for a long time since hearing a story at a slumber party about a doll that came to life and murdered her family.

I came home from the party and put these porcelain dolls i had inherited from my grandmother in my mom's room, never took them back because they freaked me out too much.

But i must say, these dolls are amazing. Their faces are so life like and I think its neat how you use them for such a creative purpose i remember you posting some other kind of art project you did with dolls before but I cant remember exactly what it was. I remember I liked it a lot though.

 

I love Shillin, Becki, and Ayoka!!!

 

Thank you, Meliai...yes, these dolls are more works of art than play thing dolls....and there are serious collectors out there. Most people who bought these dolls would never take their original thick cotton pieces of clothing they each came with off, and set them in display cases, and never touched them.....Annette was not known for her clothing of these dolls, although,, at times, some outifts were ok.....Trinchen, with the baby bird in the egg, is in her originals, for instance......The apricot cotton jumper sheath was original to Anna Lu....etc....
I dared to do what I did....as well, as a couple of other people......They get rubs easily, so one has to be very careful with them.....but there is a remedy for the rubs...Magic eraser......I certainly had lots of looks and people asking questions...and you will eventually see what odd places i took them with me....but one cannot stop art, so i did not care if people stopped and stared and did not say anything at times.....while I was out there with them all over the place...lol

Duh...Annette stopped making dolls in 2008. that was her last year. She was going to go on to making one of a kind porcelains for tens of thousands....way out fo my league. the forum still went strong with people sharing photos of their dolls and talking about them and some told stories, like me with them for a few more years.........but it slowly died there from what it had been when I first joined...always bustling with excitement about new dolls coming, . etc......I hear there are still people there.......but it is a very small crowd there now.

I have a busy day tomorrow, but I will try to post more fun photos, ASAP.
Thank you for your kind words.

 

There will be more dolls that came and went, too, to see, Aeri, with me....It was a revolving door here with them for a few years...lol
I told sentimental stories...humorous ones, etc....I will have to paint the photos, though, to my children's books, as legally, i cannot use Annette's dolls for any books I want to put together, nor would I really want to...i want to paint the photos to my own books.......but at least, i have the models in the photos to go by.....and stories all written,...writing the stories was the easy part for me.......

These dolls certainly took care of writer's block for me....as the ideas would just pour out of me ...one after the other with them.

 

That's amazing...I can't wait to see more!

 

Not much of a fan of dolls but i do like the creativity you put in your doll photos. Nice work.

Just hope they don't come to life.

 

You know....there was one or two.....that when I went into my doll room scared the crap out of me!....for real. I thought they would get up and literally start talking.....lol

The ones I still have are my velveteen rabbits now......they cannot scare me...I have 6 bigger ones... one of which I keep thinking I want to sell, but never do....but should......and 3 smaller ones left.....

Some people , like my friend in texas, has all of them...hundreds.....LOL

and not to mention the room it takes to accomodate these things...Yes, back to painting now for me.

 

Wow. I hope I don't have nightmares tonight

 

Seriously Creepy Stuff......Why Do They All Have Such "Haunting Eyes"........??...... :yikes:



Cheers Glen.

 

yeah I don't know what it is about them but they creep me out a bit.

 

Ask Annette. You are not the only person to feel that way.....
Many people do.....They are that realistic. That is how good she is as an artist.
They scared me...a couple of them, more than meant to be scary dolls like living dead dolls.....though.....because they are realistic...
I ran the other way, afterwards...lalaloopsy dolls, American Girl and comic characters......

pure heart here...always.....

 

The creeper the better.

 

"We buried our cat here...."

Monja, again....doll I still have at the grave where I buried one of my cats killed by a car....




Monja's beautiful face close-up...




Himstedt doll Henni...Hence inspiring a story about the sky falling....She was sold.




Pippi Longstocking...I used wire to get her braids to stand up here. This is Silvi...also sold...



Aloha! Pineapple girl....sold this doll.



Hula dancers.....Tinke and Lotta...these are smaller dolls....18"...who I have still...Tinke , the red head, came with bigger doll,. Monja ...That is how Annette sold the pair...and Lotta, with the blonde hair, came with another big doll named Liska, who I sold...but I kept both smaller dolls....




AAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!

Monja dressed up as a pirate....

 

A doll with a doll with a doll with a doll with a doll....all sold.....



Cat in the Hat.....doll sold...there were so many...I don't remember her name now....I do still have this costume which i wore one year...



You See Your Gypsy

Liska , who came with small doll Lotta, in above photos...sold and Alma, also sold...




CATITUDE!

Emmi, sold....



Alma, again at the birch tree I planted and put some of my father's ashes with the roots of the tree while planting it....

I miss you....story line....



SCARECROW
Luis.....the first Himstedt doll I ever bought and I sold him....




I love making snowmen.....

Ilvi, who I still have....



Front of Ilvi and her snowman....



Save a tree and decorate them outside....

Tikiri....sold...she is one of the ones that spooked me into thinking she would get up and start talking....

 

LUNA!

I made the moon......pinned it on the tree and put Lunna on the branch and made her costume....her name is Lunna and she was sold. This was a story about the moon....Speaking of the moon, there was a strawberry moon last night...and I had strawberries.....Strawberry moon does not come very often...i will put the article about it in headliners when i am done here...



The Birches....

Katiina, Finnish doll Annette made, in front of one of my painting of the birches....in her original clothes.....I sold her.

I still have my painting.



The Wedding

Monja is sitting down with the mask...on



Aoyka again, doll from Africa, who I sold and Lucky Lou cat....who died here in January 2014 and whose ashes I have and want to be mixed with some day.....not very soon, I hope.....

This was called
Bond for life



Lemonade Stand

This was one of the funniest stories I ever told with small dolls Tinke and Lotta again.....and people laughed and talked about this for a few years....Lotta was doing all of the work sweating herself sick...while Tinke just relaxed and drank lemonade while Lotta did all of the work....



"You're a mean one....."

Rinike, singer...and I don't remember the other one's name right now...both sold....this story was funny, too.





Rembrandt Girls

Monja is in the middle, only one of the three dolls i still have.
i have all of these clothes still as my favorite clothes still here....



Monja , Rembrandt girl close up, i still have and was associated with on the other forum always...




Behind the fence...

Mika, who I do not have anymore...She was the biggest doll in the doll with a doll with a doll....