Giulia Grillo: Grotesque Beauty
June 22nd, 2022
Giulia Grillo, known to her army of social media followers as Petite Doll, is photographing your nightmares. In her work she transforms into hyper-real pop surrealist characters, sliding into our world as though from a parallel universe and translating the imaginary into reality. You are never safe in Giulia’s work, as even the most beautiful image can be hiding a grotesque truth. Intrigued (and a little un-nerved) we spoke to Giulia to discuss inspiration, creative process, aesthetics and the importance of the weird.
Image Title: The Golden Egg
Public Offerings Ltd: First up, can you introduce yourself to our readers and how you would describe your art?
Giulia Grillo: My name is Giulia Grillo, aka Petite Doll, and I’m an Italian artist based in London. I define myself as a surrealist photographer as I use the medium of photography to go beyond reality. I transform myself every time into a different character, whipping from the unsettling to the cute, reflecting contemporary society and its underlying fears and desires.
POL: You call your work surreal, how do you personally define “surrealism”? Do you look to anyone else in surrealism as an art historical movement for inspiration?
GG: Surrealism is the celebration of the unconscious within the creative process, because only without the restrictions of our mind are we free to express the most authentic part of ourselves. My inspiration ranges from the traditional surrealist artists (Dalí, Magritte, Ernst, Delvaux) including also the first surrealist photographers (Dora Maar, Man Ray, Hans Bellmer), to the contemporary pop surrealist painters like Mark Ryden and sculptors like Qimmy Shimmy.
POL: We’ve read that you are looking to break the boundary between reality and fantasy in your work, and you’re taking photography out of it’s objective role, can you expand on your photographic philosophy for our readers?
GG: Surrealism and photography can appear as two very opposite. Just think that photography - in a traditional sense - means total realism and genuine objectivity. But thanks to Surrealism, photography becomes a way of transition between my imagination and reality. It’s about making real something that exists only in my mind.
“Photography becomes a way of transition between my imagination and reality. It’s about making real something that exists only in my mind.”
Image Title: Perpetual Connection
Image Title: Insomnia
POL: Talk us through your process: where do you find your inspiration? How do you turn a concept into a final image?
GG: Inspiration can literally come from everything that surrounds me. From art to everyday things, it can be a feeling or a dream that I want to express through images. Sometimes it just starts from an everyday object that I find visually interesting - so I build a concept around it. I also do a lot of visual brainstorming - it helps me to keep my imagination active. Creativity is like a muscle, the more you use the more you have.
Once I develop a concept it can take up to 4 weeks to create and get everything I need and then a full day for the photoshoot.
Image Title: Accept Cookies to View the Content
POL: Where do the costumes and make-up designs come from?
GG: I always do the makeup by myself, even if I’m not a makeup expert - but I think I gradually found my style, a sort of dolly face characterised by red nose and cheeks which became my signature makeup.
But more than makeup I think my objects/props are the most important part of the process. I’m very lucky to have the opportunity to collaborate with many talented sculptors and artists all over the world. Most of the time I’m so inspired by their work that I develop the ideas around their pieces. Other times I create the props by myself, I’ve started to experiment with different mediums and techniques like polymer clay, sfx prosthetics, resin, plaster etc.
Image Title: Cherries on Top
POL: Looking through your Instagram one thing which uniques your different characters is the red around the eyes, almost as though the character has been crying, can you talk us through emotion in your work?
GG: My appearance is largely inspired by the pop surrealist big-eyed dolls with languid gaze. There’s always a melancholic feeling I want to express and I think it can be really expressed through the eyes - that’s why I always give them emphasis through makeup, special effects and bright contacts.
POL: How much of your final images are created in camera and how much of the final image is through post production?
GG: I always use real objects to create my surreal compositions. I think they give a sense of materiality that it’s not totally achievable digitally. I only use photoshop for retouching and colour/light adjustments.
POL: You’ve been called a digital native, how does social media factor into your creative process?
GG: Since I started experimenting with my work I also started to share it on social media. It’s an ever-changing landscape and sometimes it’s a challenge for artists like me to adapt to new formats. This constant need of adaptation can become corrosive to the artist’s work, so I think the most important thing is always creating what you feel rather than what others want to see. On the other hand I think social media is a great place for conversation and dialogue, a useful tool to easily share your work like a digital vitrine.
Image Title: Take Me Back
Image Title: The Crab Girl Escaped from the Freak Show
POL: In this increasingly digital world, what do you think the future of photography is going as a medium?
GG: The role of photography has already changed since the rise of social media and today we’re assisting a massive transformation because of the global phenomenon of NFTs. To be honest I’m still quite new to this world but I think it has much potential.
“Some of my images are set in a sort of parallel dimension where time and space are not defined as the line between physical and virtual continues to blur.”
POL: There is a post-human dystopian element to your work, however you also produce work with a vintage aesthetic (pattern, colour etc.), how did you find your visual language?
GG: My work is about our present society, but at the same time it builds nervous narratives about a dystopian technological tomorrow. Some of my images are set in a sort of parallel dimension where time and space are not defined as the line between physical and virtual continues to blur. This sort of retro-futuristic atmosphere you can see in my work aims to create a tension between nostalgia of the past and uncertainty for the future.
Image Title: Skin Hunger
Image Title: In a Parallel Universe
POL: You play with the line between beauty and the grotesque, what draws you to this interplay?
GG: It’s simple: I find beauty in the unusual, the weird, the grotesque. What is considered beauty according to the standards is just boring for me. I find beauty in the grotesque because it shocks and excites that curious part of the mind that hungers for the unknown.
POL: You call In The Name of Perpetual Connection a “colourful nightmare”, where do your colour palettes come from?
GG: Everything in my work can be considered a visual paradox, even the choice of colours itself. I think colours are really important as they add another level of reading into the image. Usually my colour palettes include contrasting tones that aim to give to the images a particular dramatic and unsettling intensity, suggesting a falsely idyllic world. This is also influenced by cinematography, like Wes Anderson’s colour theory and Black Mirror in Nosedive.
Image Title: The Reflection of Yourself
“I’m convincing myself that nothing is impossible in terms of bringing an idea to life, sometimes you just need to find alternative ways.”
POL: If time and money were no object what project would you want to do?
GG: That’s a tricky one! I don’t usually think this way. When I have a project in mind that seems too far out of reach I always try to rethink it within my possibilities. I’m convincing myself that nothing is impossible in terms of bringing an idea to life, sometimes you just need to find alternative ways.
POL: What are you working on now / What’s next?
GG: I’ve recently started to experiment with video. I have to admit it’s far from my comfort zone, but I’m intrigued by the dynamism, it’s like bringing my photographs to life - almost like a performance.
Image Title: Emotional Baggage
Video Title: The Claw
Image Title: Glazed Look
About Giulia Grillo
Giulia Grillo is an artist, photographer and graphic designer practicing across the worlds of art, advertising and social media. Her surrealist language is free from reason and takes the photographic medium out of its conventional objective role. She notes: “In the name of perpetual connection explores the dark side of the constant attachment to our technological devices.” Many of Grillo’s images have been featured in magazines and her work was shortlisted for the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize 2020.