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Former soldier 'transforms' photographs with bullet holes to display gun's impact
Former British army soldier turned artist Bran Symondson says he would like to do to Bollywood what he has done to Hollywood - shoot, literally, at portraits of stars carrying weapons to make a point about the excessive glamorisation of gun culture in movies.
He has done precisely that with portraits of Brigitte Bardot, Roger Moore, Frank Sinatra, Michael Caine and other famous folk taken by the legendary British photographer, Terence Patrick O'Neill, who died in London on November 16, aged 81.
"Terry", as he was popularly known, allowed Symondson to take away 11 images selected from the photographer's huge archive accumulated over 60 years and shoot at them to demonstrate the destructive impact of guns.
In the holes made by bullets, Symondson pinned real butterflies "because obviously butterflies are symbolic of people's souls".
Butterfly collection is quite an established pastime in England. Symondson says he gets them when they have died naturally and then rehydrates them. "I buy them from a butterfly supplier - they are mainly farmed," he explains.
The O'Neill/Symondson exhibition, Hollywood Re-Loaded, at the Hofa Gallery in London's upmarket Mayfair was extended as a tribute to Terry after his passing.
Symondson...