Diana

Cooking with Diana, Goddess of the hunt

Haute cuisine and surrealism.

Erotic photography and wild boar. They seem to have no more in common than, say, the desert and snow blindness. But bring a world-class photographer, a renowned chef, and a string of top models together, and the result may well be an exhilarating piece of modern photographic surrealism with a culinary aftertaste. Or should that be culinary photography with a touch of surrealism? As it happens this is not Jean Van Cleemput's first venture into this realm of picture-perfect dreams. After the worldwide success of Beluga, his well-praised coffee table book with still lives of nude models and seafood, the Belgian master of the lens focuses this time on wildlife and big game. As he steps into this colourful imaginary world he takes along with him not only his trademark choice of beautiful women but this time also a wide range of stuffed animals. "My fascination for taxidermy dates back to my youth", he explains. "After our little nautical adventure in Beluga, I was ready for a new surrealist book project. Only this time I chose to work with stuffed animals, so as soon as I'd made up my mind about that, I started to collect all sorts of mounted animals again, just like I had done ages ago. Stuffed animals totally fit the surrealist frame I am always looking for in projects like these. Also, they are way easier to work with than living animals."