ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the case study of Maggie Taylor. Taylor, an artist living in Gainesville, Florida, creates painterly composite photographs full of imaginary scenarios, such as a woman taking off her head and carrying it in her hands, a bird reading a book, or an elephant flying. Taylor further uses Lullaby as an example to explain the process she uses to combine objects utilizing her “illogic”. For Lullaby, she began with an image she collected and was fascinated by, an 1850s daguerreotype of a beautiful and elegant woman with long curly hair. In Taylor’s composite, What Remains, the artist uses symbols to denote, exemplify, and express. In Surrounded, Taylor dramatically transformed a nightmare into a happy celebration of a dancer. She obliterated the initially referenced dream that had the potential to reveal her subconscious mind, and what is left in the final composite is the product of overcoming numerous pictorial concerns.
