'Fashion photographer Violetta Manavis makes her gallery debut with a series of photographs exploiting food and sex. The series features models wearing skimpy costumes made of faux and real fruits and vegetables, set amongst real food and provocatively “served” in each photograph as separate courses in a five course meal. At this point in “See What You Want to See” we are presented with the same sort of bait we encounter in ads everywhere. From cars to clothes to perfume to food, seduction is hard to ignore. By exaggerating the very work she is involved with on a commercial level, Manavis plays with her technical skills to create a response. By viewing this kind of photography in a gallery setting we are invited to analyze the more formal elements of design and appreciate the staged compositions as art rather than a strategy to get our attention.' -www.galleryneptune.com

Costume Design, Styling, and Food Arrangement -Violetta Manavis

Makeup and Hair-Niki Manavi,Pamela Jabonete and Jody Rusnak

In the series ‘Transformation’, I photographed myself as several female characters to demonstrate how through the use of makeup, women can adapt to different personas or characters. Though these ‘characters’, the relationships between makeup, stereotypes and women in society are explored.Combining my knowledge of makeup and photography, Transformation aims to discuss these relationships with an underlying narrative.