Fickle Sense

Michael Dooney

The proliferation of affordable, high quality digital cameras and the reality of today’s fast fashion have produced the increasingly popular online form of self expression known as fashion blogging. In 2010 two Australian sisters, living on opposite sides of the world, were inspired by this phenomenon and naively started up their own fashion blog – Fickle Sense. Mahaila the expat in Berlin and Kaye in their hometown of Perth developed an intercontinental dialogue which reflected each sisters style, creativity, travels and everyday happenings.

These images are from the Berlin half of this exchange and are a collaboration between between artistic couple Mahaila and Michael Dooney. From the beginning there was a less immediate and more thought out approach to the image making process; shooting all images with an old medium format camera and restricting each shoot to six exposures of film. This slowed down approach is also a reflection of the fashion which is handmade by Mahaila.

Over time the images became more contemplative, focusing less on the clothing and more on the narrative qualities of the image; blurring the line between fiction and reality. Themes of isolation, loneliness and cultural identity began to emerge, which was in contrast to the usual excitement and adventure of living abroad.

This is an ongoing series which will continue to unconventionally explore the medium of fashion blogging whilst embodying the spirit of slow fashion

www.ficklesense.com

Mihcael Dooney 2012