Three Beauties of the Present Day

Another entry for a DeviantArt contest back in July, 2015. The concept was to take one of three classic Japanese artworks and modify it to fit the current state of art and the world. I chose Three Beauties of the Present Day by Kitagawa Utamaro. Here's what I had to say about that back then:

With robotics advancing at astonishing rates and pushing the limits of our technological understanding in every way, it felt appropriate to include these advancements in the artwork. While a part of me loves the idea that a companion robot only needs to be as simple as HAL 9000, more of me is interested in our constant need for more skeuomorphic gynoid designs that follow our own image. Inspiration was drawn from "All Is Full Of Love" by Björk/Chris Cunningham and Edi from Mass Effect. Google image searches helped with ideas for kimono designs and hairstyles.

In creating the new artwork, many of the themes from the original were retained or incorporated in new ways. Like the original, the three faces will hopefully look nearly identical for many people, while some others will see the more subtle differences between them. The kimono textures have been changed to represent more modern geometry, and Kita's fan is now a 3D printed version. The brown tones were kept to pay homage to the original and help warm up the cold tones on the gynoids. The intense red was added for impact and because it felt appropriate for the geisha inspired styling. The three girl's original crests were moved to the ear ports to help tie it all together.

This was a fantastic idea for a contest and I was really happy to get something done and be a part of it.