Tim Walker’s astonishing pictures inspired by the V&A’s treasures

Taking photographs, to me, is really a kind of dream state,” says the English photographer Tim Walker. “As you tour your imagination, you want to photograph what you are seeing. You are so very keen to be able to show what you’ve seen that somehow it becomes true, and the picture you end up taking becomes a souvenir brought back from the daydream.”

A new exhibition at the V&A, Tim Walker: Wonderful Things, features images inspired by artefacts held in the museum’s collection. Here, Walker introduces five of the best.

Cynesias Entreating Myrrhina to Coition, 1896, by Aubrey Beardsley

I’ve always been seduced by the inky blackness, confidence and eroticism of Aubrey Beardsley’s illustrations. The V&A houses dozens of his prints. I wonder whether they’re more shocking today than they were when they were first seen over 100 years ago. Are we actually more prudish than the Victorians were?

I’ve known his work for years, but when I saw the prints close up, I could visualise them as photographs immediately. The challenge was to represent his mark-making – those seductive swirly shapes – in three-dimensional space, as if the models had stepped into a bawdy print. It felt like we were drawing in the air with suspended wires and beads.

Duckie Thot, Aubrey’s shadow, London, 2017

Portrait of Edith Sitwell, 1962, by Cecil Beaton

Dame Edith Sitwell had a striking personal style and was very photogenic, especially in her later years as she grew into her extraordinary looks. Her flamboyant wardrobe included velvet gowns, turbans, golden shoes and huge colourful rings. For this portrait, Tilda Swinton, a distant relative of Edith’s, inhabited the role of the poet at Renishaw Hall, the gothic house built in Derbyshire by the Sitwell family in the 17th century. The picture is a celebration of age and individuality – it’s a misconception that beauty is confined to the young. As Edith once said: “Why not be oneself?”

Tilda Swinton, Renishaw Hall, 2018

Tobias and Sara on their Wedding Night, c1520, Cologne, Germany

The stained glass at the V&A is a kaleidoscope of glorious transparent colours, where each panel tells a different story. There’s something special for me about vibrant, transparent colour – Christmas lights, sweet wrappers, the red light bulb in a photographic darkroom.

Illuminated red makes me think of my mother. When I was little, she made five big red silk lampshades for our sitting room. A warm glow came out of the house on winter evenings. For me, that colour represents coming home.

Sara Grace Wallerstedt, London, 2018

Krishna’s combat with Indra, Mughal Indian, c1590

Exploring the V&A’s historical paintings from South Asia reminded me how I feel when I’m in that part of the world. Luckily, England was experiencing a heatwave when we shot this picture, and the Worcestershire delphinium fields were illuminated in an intense Indian light.

Zo, Kiran Kandola, Firpal, Yusuf, Ravyanshi Mehta, Jeenu Mahadevan, Chawntell Kulkami, Radhika Nair, Pershore, Worcestershire, 2018

Dress from ‘The Horn of Plenty’ Autumn Winter collection, 2009, by Alexander McQueen

This picture is a love letter to the conservators, curators and archivists at the museum. The work they do, with great sensitivity and care, is vital. Seeing the dress by Alexander McQueen exquisitely wrapped up at the V&A Clothworkers’ Centre, it became a beautiful ghost. I imagined the characters in this photograph as mannequins coming to life in the museum. When I work with great models like Karen Elson, I often feel as if they control my camera – we perform a telepathic gestural dance.

Karen Elson, Sgaire Wood & James Crewe, London, 2018