Seen & Noted: Dos Gallos ad

The other day I was flipping through Elle Decor when this ad stopped me in my tracks. Elle Decor is a glossy magazine so filled with gorgeous images of interiors and products (editorial) and furniture, home goods, clothing and jewelry (ads) that I sometimes have trouble finding the articles, but this ad totally grabbed me.

Why?

This is the power of a great image. What’s going on here? I thought. Why is that girl holding that rooster, and who dressed her? What’s with the devil in the background? Are those broccoli heads on that table? And what kind of weird torture chamber room is this, anyway? What could this possibly be advertising?

The only answer I have is the name Dos Gallos means “two roosters,” hence the bird in arms. Otherwise, as far as I know, it’s just a really strange and compelling image that includes some antiques. One of my favorite things about it is the similarity between the faces of the girl figure on the floor and the actual living girl. What an odd, and slightly disturbing, echo.

This is why commissioned photography will never be replaced completely by stock photography. Even if you could get an image of this quality from stock (and I consider this to be fine art quality photography), you could never get all of the elements together.

Visit the Dos Gallos site for more ads from this series (click on publications and interiors). All cool, but I consider this one the best.