Miwa Yanagi’s Sombre Fairy Stories

The black-and-white photographs taken by photographer Miwa Yanagi and included in her series Fairytale are striking. The images depict reconstructions of scenes from popular tales by the Grimm brothers. Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Rapunzel… Although these are known primarily from the illustrations and animations produced by the Disney studios, in which they are given the appearance of stereotypical princesses, Miwa Yanagi takes the opposite approach.

The images present young women with almost childlike bodies, but whose faces are made up to look as if they were wearing the masks of much older women. This disturbingly large discrepancy between the age of the body and that of the face creates a strange impression that is further accentuated by the dreary ambiance that exudes from the setting.

Questioning gender stereotypes

Miwa Yanagi was born in Kobe in 1967. After graduating from Kyoto University of the Arts, she initially worked as a teacher before fully embracing a career as a photographic artist. The issue of stereotypes around women in Japanese society is one of the cornerstones of her creative output. 

Prior to presenting these young women wearing masks that age them beyond their years—a series that seeks to question the connection between the passing of time and the often ageist representations of women in fairytales—Miwa Yanagi completed another series, Elevator Girls, in which she photographed Japanese women in lifts in large Tokyo department stores. 

Fairytale (2007), a book of photographs by Miwa Yanagi, is published by Seigensha.