The German photographer Loretta Lux describes her pictures as "imaginary portraits dealing with the idea of childhood".

Loretta Lux makes pictures of children that are as charming as they are creepy - a sweet-and-sour combo that proves surprisingly hard to resist, even if you suspect the work is little more than kitsch of the most sophisticated and unnerving sort. Like Rineke Dijkstra crossed with Margaret Keane, Lux turns ordinary children into alluring aliens - icons of innocence so tainted by experience (or maybe just curdled nostalgia) they already feel antique.

I usually don't like children, but I liked her pictures, it is a beautiful work. (via Boing Boing)