Tv program showing Bethany’s work process.

Bethany de Forest creates her own worlds. Literal. She creates mystical places in the form of diorama's with existing, 'found' materials. Inspired by a city, a landscape, a special material or a current event. Through associative processes the models are created. Recognizable and yet alienating. She makes photographic and cinematic images of these self-built setups in her studio. The final artwork is usually a photograph or film. Recently she also combines films with installations or incorporates them into magical illusions.

Bethany builds her set in a large viewing box covered with mirrors. It usually starts with literally regenerating what she has seen, but eventually she lets go of reality and gives it her own interpretation, resulting in absurd fantasy worlds. Landscapes with bok choy and red cabbage as plants, castles of sugar cubes and interiors made of candy and candle wax with frogs and butterflies as protagonists. Wonderful worlds, alienating and humorous. Misleading too, objects and materials are not what they appear to be.

She wants people to think in the first instance that what they see is real/life-size. That is also her starting point. She recreates a scene in order to influence it. She bends a beautiful landscape with a boring sky to her will. Not necessarily to make it more beautiful, but more interesting ,a romantic representation.

In the Forests worlds, plants and animals often take center stage, as an eye-catcher in a colorful landscape with a rough edge. That does not necessarily make her work rosy, a threatening undertone is never far away. Current topics such as climate change, industrialization and urbanization play an increasingly important role in her themes.

In order to share these worlds with the viewer, de Forest used pinhole photography for a long time. Photography without a lens where the light entering through a very small hole creates the image. This camera was then 'locked' in the mirror box. Pinhole photography gives an enormous depth of field. Up close, the objects appear as sharp as in the

background. Due to the large angle in which the photographs are taken, the decor looks very wide. “The constructed world appears life-size as if you shrunk yourself. As a viewer you are no longer a spectator, but you are in the middle of it.”

Nowadays she also works with a digital camera. In addition to photos, she can also make films using stop-motion and timelapse techniques. With a wide-angle lens and a small aperture, she also achieves the wide look of her pinhole photos. However, the control over the end result is greater. She can immediately judge what she is doing. Coincidence plays a major role with the pinhole camera because you cannot see what you are doing and the analog film must first be developed to view the result. Seeing the first photo of a new set-up remains a magical moment. Her films and photos are all created without the use of image manipulations. Everything you see is built with basic techniques. The apparently 'real' skies, for example, consist of only cotton wool and blue garbage bags..