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Rich amber and burnished sienna feathers emerge from profound darkness in Florian W. Mueller's IKARUS Photography Artwork, presenting a parrot rendered with extraordinary chromatic complexity against…

Ikarus Photography Artwork by Florian W. Mueller is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2022 Silver A' Design Award in Photography and Photo Manipulation Design Competition Category.


SilverPhotography· 2022

Ikarus Photography Artwork

by Florian W. Mueller

Client: Florian W. Mueller Photography

Silver A' Design Award Winner in Photography Category

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Verified Award Winner

Verify Award Status for #139367

Colors

The Design

About Ikarus Photography Artwork

Ikarus is a photography series showing preserved bird specimens from extinct or highly endangered species. Each bird is portrayed in the manner of a Rembrandt painting, and the background of every portrait is a macro photograph of the feathers of that bird. The specimens were photographed in the ornithology collection of the Senckenberg Institute in Dresden, Germany. The title refers to the legend of Icarus, who flew too high and fell into the sea. Ikarus is the third part of a series collection called Neglect. The works are produced on ChromaLuxe material in limited editions.

The Recognition

About the Silver A' Design Award

Ikarus Photography Artwork is a Silver A' Design Award winner, an extraordinarily prestigious recognition granted to top-of-the-line, gorgeous, and impressive designs. Silver winners are tremendously brilliant and exceedingly creative works that illustrate the outstanding expertise, talent, and acuity of their designers. Ikarus Photography Artwork is expected to be a wonderful, showpiece work that is remarkably professional and profoundly innovative. This Silver A' Design Award-winning design is a highly notable, admired invention that benefits and advances the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology. Ikarus Photography Artwork is a vastly envied creation that evokes desires, introduces positive feelings, and sparks amazement and wonderment.

Where to Get It

Fine Art and Commercial Photography Services

We create captivating imagery that tells your story with artistic vision and technical excellence. From commercial projects to fine art commissions, our internationally awarded expertise spans architecture, landscapes, portraits, and abstract photography. Work with a photographer whose images have been exhibited in galleries worldwide.

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Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties
Here are photographed specimens of animals, most of whose species are extinct. For this series Dr. Martin Päckert, the head of the ornithology section of the Senckenberg Naturhistorische Sammlungen Dresden, he supported me very dedicated in my work.
In painting, the foolish or overconfident person is often depicted as Icarus.
Dimensions & Packaging
Produced artworks are in the size 120 x 90cm, 80 x 60cm available. All strictly limited to 5/10 pieces.
Tags
animals, photography, endangered, extinct, birds, environment, portrait, Rembrandt
Production Technology
Digital Photography, produced on ChromaLuxe material.
Design Challenge
The challenge was to set the prepared birds in scene like in a Rembrandt painting. The background of the portraits is a macro-photography of the feathers of each bird.
Research
I found that in the collection of the Senckenberg Institute in Dresden the most rare examples of extinct bird species are collected.
From a project before I had the contacts to the institute and they immediately said yes, when I asked to photograph the examples for my project. Then Dr. Martin Päckert helped me a lot with the taxonomy and the names and the origin of the birds and the preparations.
Inspiration
We know the legend of Icarus, whose father Daedalus built wings of feathers and wax for himself and his son to escape from the captivity of Minos on Crete. The son Icarus became overconfident, the wax melted, he fell into the sea. Despite his father’s warnings.
Despite warnings and admonitions, we spiral into ever higher and warmer and warmer climes, and the crash is not far away. Okay, maybe that’s a bit drastic and striking. But all photographed birds are either extinct or highly endangered.
Project Duration
It took nearly a year of research and preparation, two days of shooting and around 2 weeks of post-production.
Operation Flow
This is the third series of my collection of series, called NEGLECT. All endangered or extinct species.
I had the wonderful chance to photograph in the ornithology institue of the Senckenberg Institutes in Dresden, Germany.
Patents
Copyrights belong to Florian W. Mueller, 2022.
Image Credits
Credits:
Leica Camera Germany
Senckenberg Natural History Collections Dresden
ChromaLuxe
Photography Zingst

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