Cinderella's Revenge

I wanted to try and capture the Brothers Grimm fairy tale of Cinderella in the gory way it was portrayed. In the original tale, the details are much more gruesome than the watered down version that Walt Disney depicted in his 1950 version of the story. There was never a fairy godmother, only the ghost of Cinderella’s mother. Besides the toes, the stepsisters cut off pieces of their foot to try and make the slipper fit. In some cultures, the slipper was glass, in others, gold.
My original intent was to have the gold laces wrap in midair, but it became awkward to deal with and looked somewhat out of place. I used a varnish to coat the entire piece of wood, and a gloss to keep the blood looking as though it was still wet. The purple areas around the damaged section of the toes show the decay just before the skinworms begin to digest the rotting flesh. I’d like to think this symbolizes the extreme lengths people will go through for fame, fortune, and to make a name for themselves. Their desire is for popularity, and they could care less if their popularity trumps their own morality.
“What’s right isn’t always popular, and what’s popular isn’t always right.” - Howard Cosell