Disturbingly beautiful collages of Hollywood stars

Natalie Wood (2014)

Beauty’s only skin deep, French artist Matthieu Bourel’s handmade collages of Hollywood stars seem to suggest. With his Faces series of collage, Bourel cuts holes into studio photographs of movie stars like Natalie Wood, Frances, Farmer, Sophia Loren and Gina Lollobrigida, to reveal the hidden beauty of connective tissue, muscles, arteries and veins underneath.

Or, in his Duplicity series, he layers multiple “slices” of an actor or actress’s face one inside another, emphasising the falsity of image and beauty, or the possible truth of the character beneath. The affect is surreal, beautiful and disturbing, and “evoke a fake history or inspire nostalgia for a period in time that never truly existed.”

More of Matthieu Bourel’s collages can be seen here

Faces

Gina / Headcut (2014)

Colourfull / Diva (2013)

Loretta Young (2013)

Princess / Headcut (2013)

Back/Ground (2014)

Melancholia (2013)

Frances Farmer: Implication / Innuendo (2014)

Third Eye / Outrage (2013)

Yul (2013)

Paranoia (2103)

Assortative / Homogamie (2014)

Duplicity series

Duplicity (2014)

A wisp of a smile (2014)

Evolve (2105)

Garbo (2014)

Via Hi-Fructose and The Singing Canary.