Body Paint Artist Transforms Humans Into Realistic Animals

AN artist brings animals to life using body paint and contorted models

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Videographer / director: Gesine Marwedel
Producer: Crystal Chung, Nick Johnson
Editor: Ian Phillips

Using body paint and a model, Gesine creates a life-like swan in a park pond

At first glance, these images could be mistaken for portraits of wildlife in their natural habitat.

However, they are actually the incredible works of illusion by talented body painter Gesine Marwedel, who paints models to creates realistic animals.

In order to create this image of an ‘owl’ in a tree, the artist spent much time looking for a tree that had a hole large enough to fit a model inside

Marwedel, 29, from Dortmund, Germany has always been fascinated by the concept of transferring her designs to human bodies and her latest project features models posing in contorted positions.

Amazingly this realistic shell is actually created out of two bendy models positioned and painted to look like the outer case of a mollusc

One image appears to show an elegant swan in a park pond, whilst another picture shows a mother penguin and its chick in a snowy landscape.

The artist said: “The idea of painting animals started when I was walking and I saw some swans and I thought it would be a great idea to paint a human body like a bird.

Gesine’s incredibly detailed paint strokes allow for this model to look just like a sea turtle

"When I tried it and it worked out, I carried on painting different animals and I love it.”

Before becoming a body painter, Gesine was a speech therapist for seven years, but is now concentrating on her art.

The 29-year-old artist spends anywhere between 2-7 hours on painting each animal

The artistic painting process takes Gesine anywhere from 2-7 hours and she usually uses her friends as the models, with strangers approaching her online requesting her to paint them.

Using a natural woodland location, Marwedel transforms a model into a small red panda

Gesine said: “Usually I start with some lines on the body, I will maybe have an idea in mind and I will paint the outlines whilst the model is in the right position and afterwards I will fill in the colour whilst the model is laying down.

Gesine puts the final touches to a model crouched over to look like a deer

The artist usually uses her friends as the models and has even had strangers approach her online asking if she can paint them

“You never know if it will work or not as I never know if I can hide all of the parts of the model that I won’t use for the animal.”

As for the location, Marwedel’s latest project sees her placing the painted models in the natural habitat of the animal, as it's important that she finds the right environment for each subject - however this can often be tricky to find.

The artist hopes to bring conservation awareness to endangered animals

A model moulds herself into position to look like a penguin

Gesine said: “For the locations, I have to search for a long time, for example when I painted the owl, I had to find a tree with a big hole so that the model could stand inside of the tree.”

The self-taught artist also hopes to bring conservation awareness to endangered animals through her pictures.

You would be forgiven for believing that this is a fox curled up in it’s natural habitat

Gesine added: “People’s reactions are always positive , I have never had any negative reactions.

“People are surprised to see an animal and then to find out that it’s actually a human, they love to search for the human position, and I really enjoy watching people search for it!”