A KALTBLUT exclusive. A woman and a man are on their way home from a night out, in an unreal landscape. Is this day? Is this night? This light seems to have taken on a surreal quality. Where it hits abstract makeup, it refracts into a myriad of shiny shards, all colours of cut diamonds. Have we discovered a secret place, a new reality?
We are mere visitors to this world, the visual story created by Electronic Beats, Lauren Bowker of THE UNSEEN, a high-tech make-up company, and make-up and hair & body painting artist Janina Zais.
In the shoot (photographed by Hamburg-based Matthias Oertel), we witness its uncanny ability to precisely refract only direct digital light. It seems to expand into urban nature: Unreal flora comes alive, time blurs, and colours shift. But this is no TikTok filter, this is our new mutual reality, interwoven with new technologies of self-styling (invented by make-up artist Janina Zais). Taking this realisation to heart, Electronic Beats and THE UNSEEN consciously point towards a new optimism: As our lives increasingly become virtualized, it’s decisive to embrace and remain present, right here, right now, in this fluid reality.
Creative Direction: WAF GMBH / waf.gmbh / Instagram: @waf.gmbh for Electronic Beats / electronicbeats.net / Instagram; @electronicbeats
and THE UNSEEN / theunseen.net / Instagram: @theunseenbeauty
Photographer: Matthias Oertel / matthiasoertel.de / Instagram: @matthias_oertel
Hair & Make-up: Janina Zais / Instagram: @janinazais using Spectra by THE UNSEEN / theunseen.net
Assistant Hair & Make-up: Emma Dow / Instagram: @emma__dow
Talent: Valeriia Karaman / Instagram: @valeriiakaraman
Talent: VVarholla / Instagram: @vvarholla
Production: Lois Christman, Ella Hary, Gintare Adomaityte
Executive production & styling: Lois Christman / Instagram: @loischristmann
Art Direction: Lukas Esser & Lisa Rinaldi at WAF GMBH / waf.gmbh
Location: AF Studio
