Sometime around 1920, my grandfather traveled from Japan to various countries in Europe. The carved elderly couple traveled across the ocean back to Tokyo with him, emigrated to Shanghai, returned to Tokyo, and ultimately ended up in Chicago. On my first trip to Switzerland in 1995, my husband and I found the young girl tending the animals. The (live) cows and the sound of their bells were such a memorable part of that trip that this carved cow had to come home with us. Although acquired 75 years or so apart, the carvings come from the same town.
In photographing them, I practiced across the changing light of the day, ultimately selecting this one for the way in which the dappled sunlight and shadows appeared to place them outdoors on a sunny day. I played with various DoF to get the background as dark as possible -- these were photographed on a table in the living room and the background was very busy looking and had nothing to do with the story.
