Born to an extremely blue collar and painfully normal couple in a small desolate town located in the Mojave dessert, Ophelia was often teased by family members as being the illegitimate child of the town milk man. The apple had definitely fallen far from the tree. Not only did Ophelia not resemble her parents with bright reddish orange hair (her natural color), but sugar, spice and everything nice was a term not used to describe her as a little girl. While other neighborhood girls were showing off their new barbie dolls and playing dress up , Ophelia preferred capturing black widows in jars, burning ants with a magnifying glass and playing in the dirt with boys, which naturally carried on into her later years.
At the age of seven, in an attempt to "feminize" her daughter, Ophelia’s mother enrolled her in various dance classes such as jazz and ballet; surprisingly , she took a liking to and began performing. At the age of 14 a local model/recruiter suggested she take a stab at modeling, which was short lived. Ophelia did various print works in her home town and a few fashion shows in LA , but her father was not pleased nor did he approve of the fast life that often comes with such a seemingly superficial career. Consequently he promptly removed her from such work and that suited her just fine. Ophelia carried out the rest of her adolescence consuming alcohol and causing mischief until the day she had been awaiting came along, her 18th birthday. Ophelia packed her bags with only $300 to her name and San Diego in her sights never to look back again.
Fast forward 5 years later, 1 beautiful son, and one horrible relationship behind her, the past came full circle and she once again found herself performing, dancing, and modeling again. Only this time her method of dance was in the fashion of burlesque. Burlesque was a concept relatively new to her, so she wasn’t quite exactly sure what she was getting herself into. Ophelia’s first performance could best be described as a disastrous mess, because she had no idea what vintage burlesque was. She just went with what she knew of “modern day” burlesque, which wasn’t much. After doing some research and with a little practice, a few performances later Ophelia was up to par. She noticed a lot of popular burlesque dancer were also doing pin up modeling which was an industry making a huge comeback.
Ophelia began contacting several photographers and her career snowballed. After doing several shoots all with typical standard pin up poses, Ophelia became bored and wanted to do something more creative. She started collaborating with one of her most favorite and talented photographers, Larry of Darkmans Darkroom. Larry could truly envision the imagery that Ophelia was wanting to project, the darker side of photography.
“Don’t get me wrong, it's nice to look beautiful and have your picture taken but its more fun to captivate through emotion of any kind, be it humor, disgust, shock or sadness. If I can achieve that im at my happiest.”
~ Ophelia Handful