There’s more to the animal portraits painted by Florida-based artist Shannon Holt than meets the eye. If you look carefully, you’ll notice the canvases are actually human bodies contorted into just the right position.

The expert body-painter spends between 6 and 12 hours instructing the models to adopt the right stance and painstakingly painting every little detail of the animal she brings to life through her art. After experimenting with various mediums, Holt decided the skin was the perfect medium to express her talent. “The body was the final surface I tried before I decided skin was the key to making my work successful,” she said. “I love it because it happened automatically and beautifully with no planning – it’s a perfect creative example of how cool body painting can be. It can transform into two different images with the repositioning of the model’s arms and hands.”

Even though body-painting art is ephemeral in nature, Shannon says that’s what she loves about it. “It’s here and then it’s gone,” she told the Daytone Beach News Journal. “It’s kind of like ourselves — we’re here on the Earth and then we’re gone, and it’s beautiful.”

Photos © Shannon Holt Art

via Huffington Post