It all begins with an idea.
A number of years ago I was invited to model for seamstresses wanting to showcase their work. This notion was intriguing as I am not the typical fare that one might see as a model. I am an introvert and work in a day job where I research. So, what I look like has never been a thing of focus. I am also a woman over 40 years of age, full figured, and I am short by comparison to the leggy, lean figures with boyishly, flat features traversing catwalks and magazine covers everywhere.
The model experience of exploring a new state of presenting myself in costumes, decorated with baubles, beads, and natural elements, was fantastical. I loved this aspect. However, I soon did not feel I could embody the women I was being asked to convey. I felt a restriction, much like the corset I was wearing. It became metaphorical to way my life had felt for so long.
In a way being bound up with this restriction reflected the expectations I felt – like a corset so tight that it was depleting the very breath that made living possible.
It was then, I decided to bust out of the conditions holding me back and develop my own characters modeling perspectives of life that I wanted to explore.
This became the day Maris Corde was born.
“She wore her darkness like some girls wear a little black dress.” -jw-
Now, I get to explore the inner landscape of my dreams filled with folklore characters, fairy tales, and Celtic songs of the past, I envision my own characters as merging these aspects. Much like oracles of our ancestors they become the way-showers of life through the telling of darker stories and forbidden realms of life that has been tucked away in the shadows.
I create women who come to rescue the psyche of the world. Showing the feminine in her multitude of power through ways that have been condoned. My creations are voices of the silenced and the warriors. And they live within each of us.
People who feel a connection with my photos tell me they are drawn into worlds they had not imagined and ask me how they can experience more.
So today, I invite you to meet them further by accessing them over in my Patreon profile.
Come along in the fashioning of my costumes, the creations of scenarios, and the staging of the back grounds. I have created financial tiers where continued support helps me to bring life to these women I create.
