Shenae and Jade, 2005

Australian photographer Petrina Hicks (b. 1972) is known for images that combine the polished aesthetics of commercial photography with unexpected, often surreal subject matter. After studying photo media at the Canberra School of Art, she developed a practice centred on the representation of women, the body and the relationship between humans and animals. Her photographs are meticulously staged, with carefully controlled lighting and uncluttered backgrounds that direct attention towards the subject. In Shenae and Jade, 2005, these qualities come together in an image that initially resembles a conventional beauty portrait, before revealing a far less familiar scene.

The photograph shows a young woman, Shenae, with the head of a brightly coloured budgerigar inside her mouth. Her eyes are closed, and her expression remains composed, despite the unusual position of the bird. Hicks places the subjects against a luminous, pale background, while the model’s white top almost disappears into the surrounding space. The contrast between her freckled nose, smooth skin and dark eyelashes gives the portrait a carefully balanced visual structure. Against these muted tones, the bird’s vivid plumage becomes a focal point.

The composition is remarkably simple, allowing the encounter itself to carry the image. There is no setting to explain the situation and no obvious narrative beyond what is visible. The photograph borrows the visual language of beauty advertising, but the bird disrupts its familiar conventions. The result is an image that draws attention through its precision while leaving the viewer uncertain about how to interpret what is happening.

The image emerged at the end of a photo shoot, when Hicks asked Shenae to place the bird in her mouth. Jade was a taxidermied budgerigar, with plastic wrap placed around its head for the photograph. Hicks has explained that she was interested in the behaviour of pet birds, which can be inquisitive around their owners’ mouths. The pose was an attempt to recreate this kind of interaction in a carefully constructed image.

Knowing how the photograph was made shifts its meaning. What might initially suggest threat or discomfort can also be understood in relation to the familiarity between people and their pets. The image does not provide enough information to settle the question, and this uncertainty is part of its effect. Hicks takes a behaviour associated with everyday life and places it in a context where it becomes strange, inviting the viewer to reconsider an encounter that might otherwise go unnoticed.

Hicks’s interest in the tension between idealised appearances and unexpected subject matter extends across her wider practice. In Bruised Peaches (2018), Saluki (2023) and Nautilus (2023), she continues to work with carefully arranged subjects and the visual qualities of bodies and natural forms. Her later works Mnemosyne I and Mnemosyne VIII (2025) explore connections between humans and animals more directly. The latter takes its title from the Greek goddess of memory and presents the relationship between human and fish as one of coexistence rather than separation.

These works provide a wider context for Shenae and Jade, which similarly unsettles the distinction between human and animal. Rather than treating the bird as a background detail or accessory, Hicks makes it central to the portrait and to the viewer’s understanding of the scene. The encounter becomes a way of questioning how humans relate to other species, as well as how these relationships are represented in images.

Since its creation, Shenae and Jade has become one of Hicks’s best-known photographs. It was included in the National Gallery of Victoria’s major survey Petrina Hicks: Bleached Gothic (2019–2020), which brought together more than fifteen years of her photographic and video work. In May 2024, another print sold at auction for AU$68,750, setting an auction record for the artist at the time.

The photograph’s lasting appeal lies in its ability to hold the viewer between competing interpretations without resolving them. Its carefully controlled appearance contrasts with a subject that resists easy explanation. By combining the familiarity of a portrait with an encounter that feels unusual and difficult to place, Hicks creates an image that rewards repeated looking. What first appears to be a simple photograph becomes a more complex reflection on perception, intimacy and the boundaries between species.