Ophelia for King Kong

Photographer Danil Golovkin was inspired by the progress of Ophelia throughout the play's narrative. She begins as a blooming virgin, enamoured with her courtly love, only to become so distressed by Hamlet's treatment of her and the corruption and bitterness that pervades the Danish court that she is driven to madness and her eventual death. As a visual metaphor for this erosion of Ophelia's naivety, Golovkin and stylist Kseniya Berezovskaya painted fake tattoos onto model Julia's face, which were then steadily washed off over the course of the shoot.