When I was at college, the idea of fashion was more immediate to

“When I was at college, the idea of fashion was more immediate to me, whereas art photography, the depth of it, was a different thing. Storytelling — fanciful storytelling — can only be told through fashion photography. It's the perfect way to play with fantasy and dreams.” Thus spoke Tim Walker, the dream-weaver of modern photography, whose images shimmer with the color of myth and the touch of childhood reverie. His words are both reflection and revelation — a meditation on art, storytelling, and imagination, and how fashion, often dismissed as shallow or fleeting, can become a sacred vessel for fantasy and wonder. In his vision, fashion is not vanity, but a language of dreams.

To understand his meaning, one must understand Tim Walker himself — a photographer who grew not from the pursuit of glamour, but from the pursuit of magic. While studying at the Exeter College of Art, he discovered that fashion photography allowed him something that traditional art photography did not: the freedom to dream aloud. For him, fashion was alive, immediate, and boundless — it fused the tangible world of texture and design with the intangible world of imagination. Where art photography sought stillness and reflection, fashion photography demanded movement, emotion, and storytelling. It was, in his eyes, a living myth — a space where fantasy could take human form.

Walker’s words call back to an ancient truth: that art in all its forms is the bridge between the real and the unreal. Just as the poets of old wove the tales of gods and heroes, so does the photographer of today weave tales through light, fabric, and face. Fashion, in his philosophy, becomes a mask through which truth can speak. Its garments, though earthly, carry the spirit of transformation. Through them, one can become anything — a queen from a forgotten kingdom, a creature from another realm, or the embodiment of a dream. In this way, Walker shows us that imagination, when clothed in creativity, transcends the ordinary and touches eternity.

We see this spirit reflected in history. Consider the painters of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood — artists like Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Everett Millais — who used color, fabric, and human form to create visions of mythic beauty. Their art, like Walker’s, was a marriage of fashion and fantasy. The silken gowns, the flowing hair, the dramatic poses — all were forms of visual storytelling, echoes of an older world reborn in their time. Through these images, they sought not realism but revelation: to show the inner world made visible. So too does Walker, in his photography, craft his own mythologies — not on canvas, but through the lens, with light as his paint and the human body as his brushstroke.

In declaring that “storytelling — fanciful storytelling — can only be told through fashion photography,” Walker speaks not literally, but spiritually. He does not mean that only fashion can tell stories, but that within its world lies the permission to dream without restraint. Fashion invites excess, imagination, and play — qualities that the rigid structures of other artistic disciplines often deny. To photograph fashion, in Walker’s view, is to enter a dialogue between fantasy and form. It is the art of creating worlds that do not exist, yet feel as real as memory. For in dreams, as in his photographs, truth hides behind the mask of invention.

But there is also humility in Walker’s statement. He acknowledges that art photography — pure, intellectual, contemplative — possesses its own depth, its own gravity. Yet he chose another path, one closer to the heart of storytelling: the path of wonder. For him, the greatest art is that which awakens the child within us — the part of the soul that still believes in magic, beauty, and impossible worlds. In this, he joins the lineage of storytellers from every age, who understood that imagination is not escapism but illumination. Through fantasy, we see more clearly who we truly are.

So, my children of creation, take this wisdom to heart: do not fear the fanciful, nor scorn the dreamer’s art. For in dreaming, you find truth; in play, you find power. Let your work — whether it be painting, writing, designing, or living — become a form of storytelling. Do not merely reflect reality; reimagine it. Create worlds where beauty still matters, where the impossible breathes, where your soul may wander freely. For as Tim Walker teaches, the purpose of art is not only to show what is, but to remind us of what could be — to make the unseen visible, and to clothe the invisible in the fabric of our dreams.

And thus, remember: every life, too, is a canvas of fantasy and imagination. Dare to paint it boldly.