The Legend of “Dojoji” is a tragic love tale
depicted in many forms of Japanese traditional performing arts.
The original story tells about a young girl called Kiyohime who fell in love
with a handsome young Buddhist priest named Anchin.
He gives her false promise to visit on the way back from his journey.
Kiyohime's passion and the understanding she was deceived grows fierce transforming
her body into a big serpent.
She starts chasing after her unfaithful lover.
Meanwhile Anchin reaches Dojoji Temple and begs the priests to hide him.
They decide he hides inside a big cast bronze temple bell and Anchin follows it.
However, when the serpent reaches the temple, she wraps herself around the bell bursting into flames to heat the bell until it becomes red-hot leaving Anchin burn to a crisp.
In our visual story,
we tried to show how someone transforms from a young heartbroken girl into a monster.
Using lighting, special make-up and styling,
we manifested changing shapes and textures sliding from light into darkness,
going from smooth to rough.
Darkness captures space.
It is when the beast comes out.
However, it is not the state she want to live in
and in last photos we see how Kiyohime cries with bloody tears understanding
deep inside the spectrum of what she has become….
