Is this the most depressing art ever? Photographers stage scenes on cardboard box sets highlighting darker side of life



Startlingly lifelike images made using cardboard boxes

French artists create darkly comical scenes

They used cardboard as early attempts with dollhouses were 'too realistic'



A woman slumps in her chair in a darkened hall in the aftermath of a party, the very picture of the loneliness and isolation some people feel after the last song is played and the celebrations are over.



The picture is one of a series of miserable and disturbing - but often oddly amusing - images created by a pair of French artists who use cardboard boxes to build scenes showing the bleak side of the human experience.



Belgian photographers Maxime Delvaux, 28, and Kevin Laloux, 30, use 20 boxes per scene to painstakingly produce the disquieting scenes in a bid to showcase their talents and break into the advertising industry.

Lonely: A glum girl in a party dress sits by herself in the aftermath of a party. The scene was created by two French artists using cardboard and models

In another a rifle-wielding child in his pyjamas coldly peers down at the bloodied body of the home invader he has just gunned down by the chimney - jolly old Santa Claus.

They say the realistic scenes, which include a woman nonchalantly smoking while surveying a car that has ploughed through her kitchen wall, are intended to strike a balance between tragedy and humour.

Each bizarre scene takes between two and four days to create.

' When people first see these images there is an element of surprise,' said Maxime.



Definitely on the naughty list: Father Christmas is taken out by a young boy mistaking him for a burglar.

Nonchalant: A woman smoking a cigarette watches a Mercedes that has smashed the walls of her cardboard kitchen

'They usually don't spot the cardboard at first.

'We needed to show the skills you have to master to produce advertising photography.



'These include creating complex lightning and being able to make realistic photomontages. '

Darkness: A girl shines a torch on a mysterious pile of rickety dollhouse furniture in this scene

Light: A semi-naked man watches his clothes burn in his cardboard flat, which also begins to smoulder in the blaze

He added: 'So we first came up with making scenes in realistic miniatures houses with doll house furniture but it was too realistic so we decided to break it with a very common and recognisable material - cardboard.



'It's fun to see that even now, people don't notice at first that these scenes take place in a miniature setting.'

Maxime explained how he was able to create these extraordinary scenes using dollhouse miniatures bought from a nearby model shop.

Dark: This strange tableau of an older and younger man is both uncomfortable and saddening

A woman in her tattered living room gazes blankly into space. Each scene takes between two and four days

Narrative: A pregnant woman and her baby outside a ramshackle cardboard house. Delvaux says he wants people to create their own stories to go with each scene

Darkness and light: A child stands in the street in a corrugated cityscape in this macabre image

He said: 'There is no hidden message. We want to make people to make their own stories for each image.

