Meeting Charles Fréger

Charles Fréger, Vatican 6, from the series Empire, 2007 / courtesy of the artist

Joanna: You’ve grown up in analogue photography, now you work with digital. How does this affect your work?

Charles Fréger: It’s a question of editing. The main problem with the analogue is that the great producers like Fuji or Kodak are not experimenting anymore. So they are not improving the quality of the films anymore. So I found it pointless. It’s more difficult to find the lab to produce some analog prints of good quality, there are less and less labs. They still do that, but still often the solution is to get the scan of the film. (…) I work in series so I have a lab-series, interactive lab. I’m more flexible now about…

J: A quantity?

Charles Fréger: Not about the quantity, because when I was working on films, I had the same quantity of pictures. It’s more that I’m the only one to interact with my pictures, only one person decides how to print my pictures. And this is really difficult, it took me one year to find the way how to print my pictures.

 Charles Fréger, from the series Water-polo, 2000 / courtesy of the artist

J: Because of the control of the material?

Charles Fréger: The picture you get, the RAW you get from the digital camera, a very high quality camera, the picture is very average. You neet to – kind of – optimize the colours, with greys, blacks. It’s a decision of making digital piture, being used to analog, my eyes are used to analog, I have to find kind of a compromise with the pure digital.

J: Why do you choose to make colour photography?

Charles Fréger: It’s not a choice. I’ve worked in black&white for 2 or 3 years, and then I’ve jumped on color photography. Color works better with my subject. There’s no “why”. I just like colour photography for my work, I like it to be in colour.

J: I believe it’s common for photography today to go beyond boundaries, out of cliches and styles. Out of specialization. And you specialise in portrait photography, how do you feel about it?

Charles Fréger: I think it’s easier, it’s a choice. Like I’ve said before to one of the students, I’m not happy when photographer is going in many directions. I mean it’s not that exactly bad. I prefer to be specialised in portrait, than trying to do a lot of other stuff at the same time. Portrait is like a door open, through portrait I do something else, but it’s always starting from portrait.

J: And now are you going to specialise in performing arts?

Charles Fréger: No, no! I just push the portrait experimentations like the idea of getting into the group, sometimes experimenting on myself in wearing the costume, but the main story is always the portrait.

J: Have you ever experienced the closeness of the group, the lines and rules you simply can’t cross?

Charles Fréger: Always, actually. I always get to the limits of the group, like the passion of the group, there are some steps they don’t want me to photograph. I like to compromise with that, there are some strict rules of the groups and I can’t jump over them.

Charles Fréger, San Marino 1, from the series Empire, 2007 / courtesy of the artist

J: You’re making some sort of anthropological research. Do you feel like modern anthropologist?

Charles Fréger: No, I’m not. My work is used by some anthropologists and sociologists. There are many, many kinds of people that are using my work: fasion, costume makers, some uniforms specialists. Sometimes they are using my work as a documentary, kind of research on community. But that doesn’t make me anthropologist. It is used by anthropologist, but I’m really not one of them.

J: How do you find your groups?

Charles Fréger: It’s just like that I sometime meet somebody who tells me about something, and this is exactely what I wanted to photograph. Actually I can’t define what I want to photograph, I know what I want, but I can’t define it in words. At the moment I’ve pushed some research in Indonesia. And there is someone making research for me. I cannot say I want to photograph this and that in Indonesia. It’s more that she’s making the research and telling me what I can do there.

Charles Fréger, from the series Wilder-men, 2010 / courtesy of the artist

J: Where you found the idea of making “The Wild Men”?

Charles Fréger: I was invited by a choreographer who was making a show about that. In her show was two “Wilder mann”, heroes called “Krampus”. This was extremely fascinating! So I asked what is was, she told me about the tradition in Austria. So I decided to go to Austria and photograph these “Wilderman”. When I got there I discovered that there were plenty other groups like that. I decided to accumulate them.

J: In the end of this series, are you going to make your own costume, too?

Charles Fréger: During my next trip, I’m going to reproduce some gestures to create some costume, I’m on my way to some countries, I need to stop on the road and try to get something. But this doesn’t mean I would show this. This is more like a personal experience.

Charles Fréger as LU QIAN REN, Nang Jing Opera, 2009 / courtesy of the artist

J: What is your favorite way to contact the viewer: in a show, exhibition, a book, a website?

Charles Fréger: Books are really important objects for me. More and more I like the meetings, conferences, workshops, where you can really exchange the ideas. The traditional show I like to twist, to make it different, I try to find different way to interact with people.

J: When you make a collection of pictures, you make some sort of inventory, it’s very categorised and objective – sort of objective photography, as much as possible. And then you’re crossing the line, you’re becoming part of the group, you have personal attitude towards the group. What is more important afterwards: objective or personal?

Charles Fréger: I don’t care about objectivity; I’m fed up with objectivity! It’s not necessary to be objective. It’s more about the experience around it. When I go to some places I can have a zero experience and still I can do good images. Maybe now, the experience is more important to me, in my way of living with my photographic work and my research in general...

Charles Fréger, Hereros 16 (up), Hereros 28 (down), from the series Hereros, 2007 / courtesy of the artist

J: Your pictures are typological, to make some categorisations. What does August Sander means to you?

Charles Fréger: It’s more about the way of working, an attitude, more about that ethic. First, Sander is very close to us because he used this very typological approach in his portraits. But also the attitude toward a person, a certain ethic, the representation of humanity, and so on. For example to photograph everybody in the same way was really important. It’s extremely problematic how the photographer is treating the poor and the rich when he photographs them. Like with the rich he will be really carefull. I think it is important to be the same for everybody.

J: Please, tell me more about Piece of Cake.

Charles Fréger: It’s a network of photographers created in 2002. I created it, because I didn’t appreciate the fact that photographers are working alone and not sharing their work. I invited 25 artists to join me for a first workshop in my hometown… And from that first workshop, we really developed POC as network, with a real family spirit. We started to find a way to interact with each other. We meet twice a year now, in different capitals of Europe for three-five days. We discuss our work. We exchange our information and technical problems. We share our experience about being a photographer/artist.

J: Sort of photographical family?

Charles Fréger: Yes, you can call it like that.

J: Is there anything common within artists in Piece of Cake?

Charles Fréger: All the photographers have in common the use of something “documentary” in photography. The majority of members have something to do with documentary and also poetic work. And it evolves: the new members bring some change, of course.

J: I’ve read in interview with you that you wanted to make a film on “Majorettes”. How is it?

Charles Fréger: It was two years ago and the film is not done yet. And I’m not sure I’d be able to do it. It’s a long, long, long preparation and we have still some money missing. In three months I will know if I can do it or not, but I’m really pessimistic about it.

J: I’ll keep my fingers crossed for this! Thank you.

Charles Fréger during the lecture in Warsaw. 1/10/10 photo: JK

http://www.charlesfreger.com/

Piece of Cake: http://www.pocproject.com/

Charles Fréger was invited to run workshops on portrait photography by Akademia Fotografii school in Warsaw. Thanks to Katarzyna Majak for coordination and help. Thanks to Magdalena Wajda-Kacmajor for editing. 2.10.10 / Warszawa

Stepan Rudik on World Press Photo

In the last few years we've seen many manipulations on photography that have appeard in the main newspapers in the world, in contests, in exhibitions, albums, etc... it is though the story of political propaganda in past. But now it's even more "common", because it's so much easier to manipulate - just few clicks in the computer.
This year in the World Press Photo Contest was revealed the manipulation. Stepan Rudik, the winner of the third prize in essay in Sport category was disqualified for removing a little object from one of the photos awarded.
Michiel Munneke, managing director of World Press Photo said: "After careful consideration, we found it imperative to disqualify the photographer from the contest. The principle of World Press Photo is to promote high standards in photojournalism. Therefore, we must maintain the integrity of our organization even when the outcome is regrettable."
More official info here.
Whole story with an interesting discussion and original picture: here.

Stepan Rudik, from the series "Antisport"

I’ve asked Stepan Rudik few questions about WPP and here are his answers:

j: How you feel about your disqualification? Does this little foot of your stands the level of copy and paste some items, or erasing whole figure we know from the history?

Stepan Rudik: I believe what I did can be equated to retouching, as if it were a defect of a film.

j: I'd like to know your attitude and the way you work. When does the final form (to have it in narrow frames, black and white, grainy, dark and dramatic) of an essay start? While working, while inventing the subject, after all pictures are done - as the final touch?

Stepan Rudik: I understood that I wanted to process the pictures in the way I did when the series was ready and I looked at it as a whole.

j: Which one submission of yours was "Antisport" to WPP contest?

Stepan Rudik: It was for the second time that I submitted to the contest this year.

j: Who are your heros in photography?

Stepan Rudik: Josef Koudelka and James Nachtwey

j: To make "Antisport" was your idea or was it the assignment from some newspaper ? How you find your topics?

Stepan Rudik: The idea was mine. I photograph life, different aspects of life, and I am interested in all subjects except the boring ones.

Stepan Rudik, from the series "Antisport"

invited by joanna

Meeting Maciek Stępiński

Maciek Stępiński, Go with peace (work in progress 2008-2010), Israel

Fblog: What is conceptual art for you? Do you think it is still possible to practice conceptual photography today in the artworld today? There is a lot of searching around the edges of photography in your series “Sans Titre” – these night landscapes; the series very much deals with the differences in the viewing performed by camera, by photography and by humans; this is quite a “conceptual” striving towards the specifics of the medium.

Maciek Stępiński, Go with peace (work in progress 2008-2010), Israel
Maciek Stępiński, Sans Titre, 2007, lambda, dibond plexi, 80x80cm

Maciek Stępiński: At some point, Appolinaire named cubist painting conceptual art. In the 1960s, conceptual art was a response to the aesthetics of minimalism, and was based in the replacement of the art object, by art as an idea. What seems important for me is that it also put all the media of art on the same level. The most crucial element became the process of creating, rather than the effect itself. Has that changed? To what aesthetic trend is contemporary conceptual an answer?

I’m much influenced by Duchamp’s theory, which underlined the important part of chance as a decisive factor in the creative process. And this is photographic thinking. You might even be tempted to make the assertion that to take pictures is to deal with ready-mades. The very important part played by chance and error you may find also in my “Sclerosis” project, some sort of a ready-mades collection. The neon – “Idea” was the opening object of the exhibition in the Leto Gallery, Warsaw. The work consists of a single word “ideal, but the last letter was “broken” and didn’t come on properly.

Maciek Stępiński, Idea(l), 2009, neon, 125x25x11cm

At one point, I was interested in “meta-art” – as an extreme variation on the idea of conceptual art, created by the Art & Language group. They completely negated the visual side of an art object and concentrated their attention on the theory of art only. That was an interesting collision, because artists became theoreticans. Then, the only difference between them was the motivation, the intentions of their action.

Maciek Stępiński, Sclerosis, LETO gallery, Warsaw (installation view, Idea(l), 2009, neon)

Maciek Stępiński, Sclerosis, LETO gallery, Warsaw (installation view) 2009

I don’t know whether these night landscapes from the „Sans Titre” series can really be categorized as conceptual works, but they may be unconsciously inspired by constructivist and minimalist theories, and you know this square format, could be a straight tribute to Malevitsch…. (laughing). Definitely in this series, what we are dealing with is a searching for the edge of the visible (black), but equally “invisible” are Filip Francis’ “white on white” images or Francois Soulage’s monochromes. Here it was not a question of the specifics of the medium. The main reason to make this series was the dread I was under at that time and an attempt to escape the feeling by dealing with it like this. A part of these night landscapes emerged as preparatory material for large scale oil paintings, which however I’ve never finished.

Maciek Stępiński, Sans Titre, 2007, lambda, dibond plexi, 80x80cm

Fblog: You keep interfering in the photograph, the film or the canvas. In photography you act like a pictorialist – in the terms of Jan Bulhak, but maybe also in the terms of Alfred Stieglitz. You attach great importance to the print, and before showing it of to the world you keep working with it “post factum”.

Maciek Stępiński, Warsaw City Tennis Clubs, 2009, cibachrome 50x60cm

Maciek Stępiński: I guess I do many things uncounciously inspiried by the culture I grew up in. I think of it as a whole, of a unity – constituted by many parts. Anyway I don’t think I’m a pictorialist, or a documentary photographer! To be honest, I’m not inspired (consiously!) by old photography, and the history of photography I know rather superficially. I look at art history, again – as a whole. I do not divide it into techniques, but rather try to find the common ideas that run across it. Movies, music, poetry (lyrics) or even video games and the internet – these are my inspirations. Oh yes, and painting, most of all painting. And once again music.

Maciek Stępiński, W, 2008, lambda,dibond plexi, 80x95cm

This is why I haven’t got much in common with pictorialists such as Marian Dederko (the most important amongst them for me) who invented the “photonit” technique, which was to emphasized a strong retouching of the positive, then a reproduction of that positive and making a new positive from this new contr-negative. Wolfgang Tillmans today works in a quite similar way: enlarging photographs that are photocopies of tabloid and newspaper photographs or showing “wrongly exposed” photographic papers, while making from them other reproductions, changing the form of the prints, etc.

Maciek Stępiński , W, 2008, lambda,dibond plexi, 80x95cm

Maciek Stępiński, Warsaw City Tennis Clubs, Kordegarda 2009 (installation view, WCTC, cibachrome 50x60)

But techniques and technologies (their pros and cons) that’s the final touch. A cibachrome print will look good only if the chrome is well exposed. It’s not as much of a change as, for example, in HDR where the final outcome differs substantially from the original. In the case of “Warsaw City Tennis Clubs” it’s rather the reverse.

The choice of the cibachrome technique was the best to have exactly the same colours as on a diapositive, without lambda profiles, correction by machines or an operator, calibration of the screen, part of the paper or finally the use of chemical materials… Here a great deal was made possible thanks to a great contact and full cooperation with an extraordinary French technical specialist Roland Dufau, who printed in Paris these pictures for the exhibition in Kordegarda, Warsaw. It was the first time I could show prints I’ve always dreamed of showing (thanks to Magda Kardasz – curator at the Kordegarda and Zacheta Galleries) . So, yes, I put a lot of effort into the final print of my pictures, but in order to make them as near as possible to the original (or at least as I remember it (laughing)).

Maciek Stępiński, Paysage Urbain, 1999, C-print, 78x78cm

Fblog: Do you divide somehow your artistic work from your academic concerns? You work in France and Poland. Could you compare these two cultures – as far as we are concerned, i.e. young people approaching art and photography. I’m sure it’s quite different.

Maciek Stępiński: I try to divide these two types of work, but sometimes they interfere with one another and there are influences on both sides. There’s a satisfaction in both of them: meeting people gives a lot of positive energy, their criticisms and doubts about the photographic medium is a sort of encouragement to creative work.

Maciek Stępiński, N-113, 2002, lambda, dibond, 50x50cm

As far as comparison is concerned, I can’t make one regarding education, because I have never studied photography in Poland. Regarding the level photographic education in our country, I get information from friends who teach in Lodz in the “Filmschool” or from students from Lodz, Poznan, or from my students from the Academy of Photography in Warsaw and Cracow. The level of lectures and the equipement used during workshops unquestionably matches that of the top european schools. The difference I see, might lie in the motivation for undertaking such studies.

In countries like Holland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and France, young people are well acquainted with art from the very beginning of their school education. There is undoubtedly a much wider range of schools, with more tightly defined profiles, because they have already been active for many years now. There is a clear division between artistic and technical-commercial institutions. A very big advantage is the scholarship programme, so students may focus on their projects, instead of taking every job possible to pay their rent. But here the main point is still not about money, but about the motivation. In my opinion Poland is going through a time of high and wild consumption, as France was at the end of the 60. That’s why some might perceive being a photographer as a quite easy way to become wealthy fast, through fashion and advertisement photography.

In conclusion, I would say that the Polish contemporary art scene is much more interesting and dynamic than in Paris or Marseille. And though there are ten times fewer people interested and familiar with art as compared to the rest of Western Europe, collectors and art merchants are much more frequent visitors here now.

Maciek Stępiński, LGV 2004, lambda, dibond, 80x80cm

Maciek Stępiński - photographer, painter and video artist, working in France and Poland. interview was made in dec09/jan10 by joanna and was inspired by Maciek exhibition "Warsaw City Tennis Clubs" in Kordegarda gallery, branch of Zacheta in 2009. more info and pictures: http://www.stepinski.com/

meeting Alex Majoli (part 2)

continuation of the interview /made in march 09 in Warsaw/ /part 1. here/

Fblog: Now you’ve mentioned commissions for museum, so I’d like to ask where do you want to show your works? Do you like them to be printed in books, shown in some museums or galleries, in a newspaper? Where does your pictures belong?

Alex Majoli: I think everywhere. I think each project has a better location than others, but not every project needs a special location among the others. I like when pictures are photocopies, so you can just give it in the streets, just like that. Actually “One vote” was supposed to be like this in the beginning.

Fblog: So you like to give pictures to the people in the streets, but to those you’ve photographed previously?
Alex Majoli: No, at the beginning – it was an elecetion day, supposed to give photocopies to a lot of people in the street, photocopies of faces, but…it didn’t came up, because, well… I’m not good on promoting my work at that level.

Alex Majoli, from the exhibition Un monde en partage, 2008, photo courtesy of The Foundation Group TP.

Fblog: Well, you’ve said something about Samurai development, and it’s been your most important quotation, it appears almost everywhere along with your name…
Alex Majoli: OK, everybody ask this! OK, this quotation – when I’ve done some workshop I had to say something, and I didn’t want to make some bullshit like “I’m the best photographer in the world” so actually I wrote something like that as a joke. They accepted it and didn’t understand it was a joke. I think you can’t teach photography, but I think as a Samurai you can do an every day little things. Discipline, determination. You know you need to prepare to take picture. I can not teach you that, I can tell you only: don’t distract, escape, stay there, don’t move, but I can’t tell you how to take it.
Most of my students keep making pictures like this [AM: acts like a photographer in candid, shaking, very nervous]… and then I say: “relax, you can’t make pictures like that. Think about it. Relax.” [AM: acts slowly, knowing what to do, determined and relaxed], and it’s not working, so again I’m saying “Get relaxed, come closer, move, concentrate on process.” You can do only that.

Fblog: What is your process approaching the subcject?
Alex Majoli: Determination, work, work, work a lot. Work.
Fblog: Have you ever asked for a permission to take picture?
Alex Majoli: Depends, depends.
Fblog: In the streets?
Alex Majoli: Depends. Sometimes I don’t need to. It’s something I teach: try to decide before if you really want to take the picture. Sometimes you’re taking picture that you really don’t want to. And then you put yourself in trouble. If a person you photogeaphed sees that you don’t really care about them, and you just play around –
And if you care, you’re taking pictures of people walking down the street, they understand that, maybe they will ask you why, but they don’t do some crazy and stupid thing. If you hesitate: “I’d take!”, “no I don’t!”… this hesitating it’s like a dishonor, the feelings you give though that, it’s obvious there’s no real purpose in that.

Fblog: What would you say to a budding photographer? Go to some exhibitions, see as much as possible?
Alex Majoli: Don’t look at other photographers. Don’t think you’re photographer. Read all books. I say work, work, work, just try to be yourself. Work a lot and read books. Get out from photography and then go back. That’s most important.

Fblog: Are you fan of football?
Alex Majoli: No, but I like this a lot.
Fblog: Well, you’re Italian…
Alex Majoli: You have to be Catholic, you’re Polish.
Fblog: Yes, stereotypes…
Alex Majoli: Even if you don’t believe, but you have to.
Fblog: Do you know any Polish photographer? You’ve been here before, so maybe you had the chance to meet some?
Alex Majoli: I know one Polish photographer, but actually I like you to recall, he’s name is Piotr, he was working for the Polish main newspaper.
Fblog: So you probably mean Gazeta Wyborcza?
Alex Majoli: Maybe. I met him in Kumbh Mela in India. We had a really good time together, but then he’ve dissapeard. I also met him in Israel during the second intifade. I don’t remember his surename. He is a tall, blonde guy. If you know him…
Fblog: I think it’s Piotr Janowski.
Alex Majoli: Well, if you see him, say from me “hey, don’t dissapear like this!”

Alex Majoli, from the exhibition Un monde en partage, 2008, photo courtesy of The Foundation Group TP.

Fblog: How much time you spent in Italy/NY?

Alex Majoli: I would say half and half, and the rest is travelling to take some pictures.
Fblog: You have a company near Milan, it’s called Cesuralab.
Alex Majoli: Cesura is the place where I live in Italy. It became my studio. And now as I have one assistant, and some other guys there, I think this studio might me something bigger than just a place where I make pictures. More than just a studio. I ‘ve invested some money, wanting to create of this a place where the young photographers can come and participate… I want to give them a time and a chance for a proper project. It works fine and they create some “collective of photography” and they spend some more and more time in the agency. I don’t know. At the moment it’s like this. Could be much more.
There is a gallery. We’re doing some workshop there now. I try to do something interesting, not because of it’s interestingness, but the place is like a playground. Like, you know, you have kids and if you give them a place to play, the kids play. I want to do the same with my assistants, but they don’t play. I say: "you have a printer, you have a computer, you have a big beautiful space, you’ve got everything you want!" And they just sit and think. I’m asking them: “hey, why you’re sitting?” Why you don’t use it? They keep philosophying on photography instead. “C’mon guys! Move the ass now! Make some pictures!” And they sit, they criticise other photographers! I mean" "who are you man?!" And it’s common within young photographers, I can’t understand that!
Fblog: Well you know, it’s capitalistic era, you need to compare the things before you buy them, you go to the market to compare, to choose. If you’re making pictures, you still need to compare yourself to the others?
Alex Majoli: Yeah, OK! I know, if you have kids, you can’t tell them “don’t look into the television”, sometimes you have to compromise, one hour and then do something different. But these guys do only that. I say: “take some pictures.” And they reply: “of what? why?" So I’m taking a picture of it and they like it and say: “No! but you’re a good photographer!”. My answer is: “No I’m not! I’m just taking pictures, while you don’t!” It’s always like that! They need to have a big story, they need to go to Iraq to take a pictures. C’mon take a picture here!

Fblog: Who is your best friend in Magnum? I mean: fellow photographers, accountant, secretary?
Alex Majoli: Well, I have many friends in Magnum. Too many, starting from my best friend, a very good photographer who was in Magnum – Luc Delahay. I know there are good friends: Thomas, Antoine, Alex... They are all good photographers and good friends. Alec Soth, Thomas Dworzak, Chris Anderson, Antoine d’Agata definitely good friend and helping, Joseph Koudelka is a good friend. I have many friends there, that’s good. And many others!

Fblog: Thank you very much. Wishing you luck and good friends always around.
Alex Majoli: Thank you!

joanna: I couldn't resist to ask about Polish photographer. It was a nice inquiry who that might be. Finnaly it came up and it would came up to you one day too, I hope. Thanks for you patience while reading this :)

meeting photographers: Alex Majoli

Alex Majoli, from the exhibition Un monde en partage, 2008, photo courtesy of The Foundation Group TP.

Fblog /joanna/: let me first introduce myself. I work in the gallery of fine arts, I deal with photography mainly in the education goals. I represent the Fblog, which is international group of people. It is a blog “about photography, with photographs by photographers”.We’ve been lately talking with Alec Soth or Martin Parr.
Mr Majoli, how would you describe your work? You are photographer, photojournalist, war-photographer, or documentary photographer…?

Alex Majoli: No, that is up to you to describe, not me.

Fblog: So how would you describe yourself?

Alex Majoli: I don’t. I’m just making picture. I’m a photojournalist, but also… it’s not easy to categorise, if you look at my war picture then i’m a war photograper, if you look on my “isolation” pictures then i’m art photographer, if you look my portrait, then i’m an editorial portrait photographer. Sometimes i do advertisement photography, so i’m an advertisement photographer. How can you describe this?

Fblog: We call it in Poland “an interesting person”. Afterall you cover all these topics.

Alex Majoli: Yeah, the country I come from is famous of it’s handicrafts, in everything. They’re able to riddle the things out of everything! But now it’s all going to merge.

Fblog: As we’re in Italy now, who is your favourite Italian writer? You’ve mentioned Luigi Pirandello in your “Libera Me” project…

Alex Majoli: One of my most favourite is definitely Pirandello, but there are many others. Calvino, Tabucchi, they are many… but favourite is Pirandello.

Fblog: And your favourite, the best photographer from Italy?

Alex Majoli: Can I name two? Luigi Ghirri and Mario Giacomelli.
Fblog: What was the hardest assignement you’ve get?

Alex Majoli: There were many different difficulties on an assignement. We say the hardest could be the last one, always. One was in Ghaza… because it was difficult to get access. And the other one was doing an documentary about jamaican diaspora in London. It was extremely difficult to photograph, and filming (because there was also documentary film), to make an access and do something that made sense. I had never as much difficulties in my life to get access to it.

Fblog: You’ve wrote on your Magnum site that once you had a big problem with power supply, you couldn’t charged your batteries, that was suprising and you weren’t ready for these circumstancves… do you remember in which project it was?

Alex Majoli: Maybe it was in Afghanistan, or it was one of the latest in Iraq, but no, in Iraq we always had some military power supply, I think it was Afghanistan.

Fblog: How does ideas for your personal projects emerge?

Alex Majoli: I believe in encounters. Like meet people and their stories, definitely. And I like to make a mathematic combination of things between who you are and what is your experience. Most of my projects, for example, my personal project come from a single fact that I work a lot in a place and then I found that something about this place that haven’t been told or I’m really interested on it.
I always have a list of things to do, of big projects. You’re never going through, you forget, and never do that. Sometimes you forget. At the moment I’m doing something about Brasil and I want to keep on working on this “Libera Me” project, which is completely different.

Fblog: So you’re saying you work sometimes with a mathematical approach…

Alex Majoli: Mathematical, cause it’s about simple things. It goes like this: I like to photograph that city. And then, in that city: I like to photograph this and that, and then I’m coming from this culture and I assume my life to photograph the things.

Fblog: I’m not surprised by your “mathematical” approach, cause I believe “one vote” is a very conceptulised project.

Alex Majoli: It is!

Fblog: It’s your first and only ver conceptulised one…

Alex Majoli: But there is much more things to say, that you don’t know about, and maybe someday as my website – as I got one done, and show something much more conceptual than that! There are a lot of things I’ve done much more conceptual. For example photographed two chairs in my studio.

Fblog: You mean something like Joseph Kossuth?

Alex Majoli: With the 4x5. They look at each other, then they go against, an then they make love at the end. And that is really conceptual.

Alex Majoli, from the exhibition Un monde en partage, 2008, photo courtesy of The Foundation Group TP.

Fblog: Why these conceptual ideas are in your work?

Alex Majoli: I’ve studied art! You know, there is always something. I can’t define myself. I like to be a photojournalist, to photograph events, but then sometimes there is something that can lock me up, lock me inside in some situations and I need to express myself much more freely. And concept, I like when a concept comes from a real life, is not much thinking.

And about these chairs, I just had a big fight with my girlfriend. I would never do it, cause I wanted to do something for this or that museum. It was like this, we had a big fight, then I was alone. There were two chairs, supposed to be us, like selfportrait, and we fight, and I was left alone with the camera and these two chairs. So I started to make a love story of these chairs. The playground of love, this is a very little stupid series of two chairs.

I tell you one thing, about concepts. Once some people asked me to do a photography for an auction. It was some group for charity for refugee children and the money was supposed to go to the children who needs money, clothing, whatever refugee needs. So they’ve asked me for a picture made for children.So I’ve said, yes of course I can deliver a picture to make some money for children.

Then I was going through divorce. And there arrived a letter. I received one from a lawyers it was an agreement about my daughter. So it was something like this: the daughter can go out, the daugfhter can do this and can’t do that, la la, and I found myself so pathetic in this situation. I decided to take picture of this letter from the lawyer and I’ve sent this letter, a picture of this letter to the group. And they said “well we expected a picture.”

And I said: “yes, it’s a picture”, and you can’t accept this concept of the picture. Because it tells a lot of things. I also wrote some text to explain what is it about and it was sold for a highest bid, anyway!

PART1 / Alex Majoli / interview / 4.03.09 in French Insitute in Warsaw /

PART 2 --> here

thanks to Foundation of the Group TP / co-organized by Yours Gallery /

intervied by joanna kinowska / help by Sebastian Nowakowski

meeting with Alex Majoli / soon

March 09 Fblog had a conversation with Alex Majoli. Stay tuned for the interview!
Alex Majoli /born 1971/. Italian photographer. From 1996 in Magnum. One of the youngest in the agency. Books, exhibitions, projects, etc...these most important:
Leros, One Vote, France05 Marseille for Euromed, and several more.

alex majoli in magnum
alex majoli / cesuralab
alex majoli speaking youtube

Alex doesn't posses any personal website.

Piece of me - new exhibition by Sannah Kvist

Sannah Kvist was born in 1986. Apart from being a freelance photographer, she is also the photo editor of music magazine Novell as well as one of the collective owners of the Stockholm gallery 1*1.

I tried to take a picture of Sannah herself, but as always photographers are hard to catch.


Sannah has appeared as a guest on the F blog twice and her clean images have intrigued many of us. In her new series Piece of me she takes her imagery to an even stricter level of hushed down colours and stripped environments. There is only a soft hint of skin tone and the occassional blue that makes the milky whiteness of her images even whiter. This method makes every detail seem important and more than once I found myself staring at birthmarks, indentions in sheets or tiny holes in the background walls. To me, her work is uncanny. The motif, mostly the human body, is presented as something surreal. The human body should seem familiar and the settings homely and everydayish, but there is something about the way she approaches her motives that makes everything seem not homely; uncanny. None of the images show faces or even heads for that matter. We see arms and feet and a hand clutching its owner's back. In Sannah's images things out of daily life seem too real to not be unreal.


When talking about the image shown above, Sannah says that she is very ambivalent about how it turned out. When asked why, she says "I don't know, I guess it's because it looks so much like a typical girl photo" Still, she decided to show it in her exhibition along with a beautiful, intriguing and milky white set of images under the name of Pieces of me

The exhibition is only open for one week, so hurry up and go there!



For more information contact Sannah
www.sannahkvist.se

invited guest & e-talk with Jason Lazarus

Jason Lazarus: "Greg's Geronimo portrait for the road" from the living with a portrait series.

Joanna: I've noticed pictures from "Living with a portrait" series from Jason Lazarus somewhere in the internet. They suddenly became very familiar and important to me. This series started some new ideas and questions. I've found Jason and asked him to answer some of these concerning documentary photography.

Fblog: For me “Living with a portrait" is a double attempt: artistic one and documentary one. Do you agree? What "documentary photography and "artist photography" means to you?

Jason Lazarus: The distinction is not important to me...documentary work leverages the idea of truth without being truthful...good art is truthful to the artist's intentions.

Fblog: As far as i know - you also teach photography. It's more about practice or about theory?

Jason Lazarus: It's about practice practice practice as an artist. For me, the word 'practice' includes elements of a work ethic, theory, art historical knowledge, life experience, sense of curiosity and intellectual vigor.

Jason Lazarus "The top of the chestnut tre7e gazed upon by Anne Frank while in hiding (Amsterdam, 2008)"

Fblog: What have you used during your practice: which theory have made a big impact on your work? What special events can define it?

Jason Lazarus: There is no theory that made a big impact on this project. “The living with a portrait” series started off with the picture of JFK on the pink walls… I made that image and it was 'an orphan' -- it didn't belong to a project. I thought the image was evocative -- Who in the world had pink walls and a JFK portrait in their bedroom? I know the answer, but I thought the lack of an answer was more interesting and opened up a dialogue that could be continued in other pictures. It seemed ripe as a serial project...

Jason Lazarus: "Lindsey's bedroom" from the living with a portrait series 2007

Fblog: What gives you the inspiration to work?

Jason Lazarus: A great and complicated question... My undergraduate degree was in marketing. I grew tired of marketing/consumerism/selling/advertising/etc... I went to graduate school for photography, because I wanted to make things not from a sales objective standpoint but from a very personal, idiosyncratic place. The satisfcation from making a piece within this framework is the ultimate in human nourishment for me.

Fblog: Interesting answer and story! But currently? For example what have given you the inspiration - why choosing this or that theme to work with?

Jason Lazarus: To be more specific, I am interested in 'charged spaces'... Places that have public or private resonance or significance. The LWP series is an example of these quiet, privately charged spaces. I want them to feel intimate and as real as they are...

Jason Lazarus "The back of an Ad Reinhardt" wright commission series 2007

Fblog: Is there any photographer/artist who made a great influence of your work?

Jason Lazarus: ...Gerhard Richter, Wolfgang Tillmans, The Dusseldorf School, Hirst, Whiteread, Maurizio Cattelan, Baldessari, Ruscha. In terms of younger artists I am thinking about: Amanda Rossho, Erik Kessels, Joachim Schmid, Harrell Fletcher, Greg Stimac, Walead Beshty, Claudia Angelmaier... These guys I think about a lot. They all have very strong voices--they all seem to work with a burning inner logic.

Fblog: I see little photography here. And it's a question of impossibility of dividing art now from photography?

Jason Lazarus: Yes. As much, if not more inspiration comes from non-photographers...

Fblog: And a tricky question - have you seen all these pieces of art - I mean have you seen these artists' works by yourself in the museums, galleries, or in the magazine, book, internet? Which medium you prefer? It’s the matter of reproduction-age.

Jason Lazarus: Half I've seen in person, half either online, in books, or in journals. It's all about consuming work whenever I can...going to see something in person, if I like it, tends to affect me for years, so obviously that is preferred!

Jason Lazarus: "Spencer Elden in his last year of high school (Jan '08)" Spencer originally appeared as a naked baby on the cover of Nirvana's Nevermind record.

Fblog: I would like to ask for details on "living with a portrait". Please explain what's going on there?(apart from statement) how many pictures were made to have this series? is it already finished? would you try to extend this?

Jason Lazarus: The project explores, for me, the charged relationship people have with images that they live with...usually framed images or ones given some kind of objecthood and placement that gives them physical/emotional visibility. If someone is attached to an image, I am interested in this immensely. I think of it as creating a self-portrait of the owner of the portrait by only showing the portrait. Further, I try not to show too much else...I don't aim to make environmental portraits of portraits...the less info the better... It seems to focus the viewer more on the inexplicable and committed aspects of the portrait/portrait-owner relationship. This series is ongoing...I am working on it slowly and am currently prioritizing other projects...

Fblog(joanna): thank you Jason for the e-talk.

Jason Lazarus "Jenny Holzer, over and over again (long exposure)" wright commission series 2007

Meeting Smoliansky

Being in the right place
– Gunnar Smoliansky and his photography
All pictures © Gunnar Smoliansky unless otherwise stated. Text by Anders Blomqvist.

Photo by Anders Blomqvist

Gunnar Smoliansky is just about to release his book One Picture at a Time. This past year the corresponding exhibition has been shown in both Gothenburg and Stockholm in Sweden. “I photograph the things I see” Smoliansky says humbly. Behind these words are 50 years of experience of active photography where the subjects vary but his personal signature of two-dimensionality and tonality is evident all the time. He shuns the word “project” and prefers to treat his pictures individually from the moment he exposes the negative until he has the judged the final print. This has given Gunnar Smoliansky’s work a quality characterised by originality and solidity.

"I really dislike projects" says Gunnar. “I try to avoid being involved in one if possible. I prefer to just take one picture at a time.” – Hence, the title was set for his latest exhibition and book. It says a lot about how Gunnar Smoliansky works as a photographer.

I am sitting with Smoliansky at a café at Söder in Stockholm. There are lots of people around us and the traffic is busy. His latest exhibition One Picture at a Time has been shown this summer at Kulturhuset in Stockholm and the book is expected to be released in the first quarter of 2009. It is not an ordinary exhibition and book Smoliansky is serving us: All the pictures have been selected in collaboration with his colleagues Jäger Arén, the curator of the exhibition, and Henrik Nygren, who has made several of Smoliansky’s earlier books. Gradually, in discussion with Arén and Nygren, the numerous prints for the book have been reduced from 1000 to 285, and the exhibitions have shown even less pictures. The selected material spans over the time period between 1952 and 2008 and the prints are shown neither chronologically nor in a thematic order. Consequently, as a viewer, one jumps between decades and motifs in this retrospective exhibition.

The pictures ripen with time
”Topicality has never been my thing” says Smoliansky smiling when he says that his pictures need to ripen before they can be shown. By the years, Gunnar has developed a working method that suits him perfectly. When he’s just about to expose his negative, he will just follow his gut feeling. “Today I’ll just pick up the camera, take the picture, and then just walk on…” he explains. Once he has the developed negatives in his hand, he studies them over and over again, and lets an intellectual interpretation take place. The negatives and the prints may sometimes need a week or even a year to be approved by Gunnar. Once enough photographs have been accepted, Gunnar considers compiling the achieved material for an exhibition and even a book. Sometimes this process may happen quickly, like it happened for the exhibition Sotbrand (Eng: “chimney fire”) On the other hand, sometimes it may take decades as it did for the prints of the exhibition of “Waldemarsudde” (a part of an island in central Stockholm).

The idea behind Sotbrand emerged suddenly when a friend’s apartment was ruined by a chimney fire. Gunnar received a call from his friend suggesting he should come over and take some pictures. When Gunnar arrived the flat was covered with soot, like a fine mezzotint layer covering everything. It was in the middle of the summer and very hot, but opening a window was not an option – even a tiny gust of air would have ruined the delicate layer of carbon. “I stepped in to the apartment… took off my shoes, my clothes, and put them on a fresh newspaper next to the entrance door” he tells me and continues “There I stood, in my underwear, looking down in the focusing hood of my Hasselblad and I could feel how the sweat was dripping down on the focusing screen!” Altogether, he spent a few hours in the apartment during two days. “I couldn’t stand it any longer!” he says. Nevertheless, the pictures were taken and the material finally became an exhibition and a book.

On the other hand, the material for “Waldemarsudde” required a longer time to develop. Originally, Gunnar met up with a friend at Waldemarsudde very early on Sunday mornings. The walked around independently of each other and took pictures. Year by year, Gunnar returned to Waldemarsudde and expanded his collections of pictures from that area. After 12 years, Gunnar finally decided to show the images at the art museum on Waldemarsudde.

Personal style arrived early
Smoliansky started to take photographs in the early 50’s by using a Rolleiflex. “The viewing screen and the square format of the camera turned out to be perfect to learn how to photograph and compose pictures” Gunnar remembers. He never strives to achieve a depth in his pictures. He prefers to regard the subjects as a two-dimensional surface and he composes them very strictly and simply, if possible having parallel lines and no leaning lines.

Already after six or seven rolls of film, he had gotten a grip on what his personal style was. “I was all settled when I started in Christer Strömholm’s photography school” Gunnar says calmly.

Gunnar Smoliansky’s prints very seldom have the pitch black tone many photographers are striving for these days. He prefers to be in the tonal range between black and white “I want the viewer to sense something in the darkest parts of a print” Gunnar argues. Also, in contrast to all the large prints photographers make these days, Gunnar prefers small prints. As a viewer, you are forced to take a step forward in order to see the details. “It should be a close meeting between you and the photograph” Gunnar explains. He doesn’t hesitate to frame a small contact print measuring 9x9 cm (approx. 3.5”x3.5”) and he avoids making larger prints than 24x30 cm (10”x12”). “Larger prints than that would be something completely different” – Gunnar’s photography feels sublime and contemplative. It doesn’t yell for attention – rather, it invites the viewer into a whispering dialogue.

Before the integrity

The time in Strömholm’s school was a very social time where contacts and friends were made but also his technical skills were improved: ”We could be 25-30 people sitting around a table” Gunnar says and remembers occasions when Christer Strömholm could ask someone to hand over his Leica to him. Once receiving it, Christer changed all the settings on the camera and handed it back. Once returned, the photographer had to set a given aperture, time and focus without looking. Gunnar could practise this when he was strolling on the streets of Stockholm, he measured the light, adjusted the settings of his Leica and was prepared to just aim and shoot before the “decisive moment” disappeared. If it was a portrait of a human being, Gunnar always made eye contact with the person and exchanged a greeting – “… back then, it was no problem: The word “integrity” wasn’t invented yet and people were not worried”. It was simply easier to photograph people during the 50’s and the 60’s.

His own path
A more negative attitude towards photographers emerged in the late 60’s when Japanese cameras became everyone’s property. All of a sudden, everyone was taking pictures and more and more people were disturbed by this crowd of photographers. This was a signal to Gunnar to move on, to do something else. He bought a SLR and a macro lens and started to focus on details, things that were connected to people.

There was also a change in the technical routines he had acquired in the photography school. “Everyone was using the same type of film, the same developer, the same paper and it all ended up with very similar images” Gunnar describes the feeling of uniformity that grew stronger and stronger during the 70’s.

When he visited London in 1975 in order to see a Paul Strand exhibition, this was also his first contact the American photography – the break with the Swedish photography became very obvious. “You could see qualities that you hadn’t seen before […] you were wondering: why is that? Do they have better stuff to work with? Do they keep the better photographic papers and send the litter to us? It took some time before one understood it was a matter of larger negative sizes!”

Once he had realised that, Gunnar adopted the large format too. The change of format also created a curiosity of learning more about old techniques. He then realized that much of that knowledge was forgotten among other photographers. “Once you adopt a new technique, you tend to forget about what has been learnt previously” he remarks. Thanks to his colleagues, he managed to get his hands on old handbooks and recipes, and eventually he bought his own chemicals to make his own developers. He also ended up collecting and using old photographic papers. On his travels northbound, he would stop in small villages and ask every single photographer if they had any old papers to sell. “It still happens that I make a print on old Gevaert paper” says Gunnar when we discuss the qualities of these papers, but he does not express any nostalgic loss of these papers: he just states the fact the papers available are just fine. Today, he even lets a local photographic store do the processing of his films. Being 75 years old (in year 2008) he would rather spend his time doing prints in his darkroom.

About being in the right place

“To take good pictures is just a matter of being in the right place – everything else is just a way to mystify the procedure,” says Gunnar. A place full of objects asking to be photographed will usually be rejected by Gunnar. “That’s probably the most sensible thing one can do” he adds. The expectations and visions one may have when being there are easily turned into great disappointments when the prints are made. Instead, Gunnar prefers to identify something novel in common daily life objects and situations. Such subjects are easily neglected and therefore not readily seen in general. A fine example is Gunnar’s work on buildings and the play of shadows and lines.

Even when looking at his early work from the 50’s, the distance and the clean compositions feel right and wear the typical signature of Gunnar Smoliansky. He never cleans up things around the object when he takes the photograph, nor does he retouch his prints afterwards (with the exception of dust etc), such a thing would be entirely foreign to him. When I see Gunnar’s artwork, I smile when I see familiar objects being interpreted in a new way: like a can flattened by a car wheel or a picture of a drainpipe in slush. All of a sudden, I understand why he says that you need fresh eyes and not experience when you are about to take a photograph.

When it comes to inspiration
When it comes to photographers that inspire, Gunnar mentions established photographers like Eugené Atget, Bill Brandt, Walker Evans, Aaron Siskind, Harry Callahan , and Lee Friedlander. ”You will get a lot from these photographers… Bill Brandt is perhaps the greatest of them all, he really grows” Gunnar remarks, but I can see that he is not entirely satisfied with the answer. He ponders and then smiles; he mentions a book by Jeffrey Fraenkel, The Book of Shadows. The book contains pictures made by amateur photographers who have photographed their own shadows. With enthusiasm he tells me about the power of these photographs taken by unknown photographers. “The photograph itself is a greater inspiration rather than the (name of the) photographer” Gunnar concludes and now looks satisfied with the answer.

The time runs out and Gunnar excuses himself, the opening of an exhibition is waiting and he needs to run. A bus is stopping for us when we are just about to cross the street but he waves to the chauffeur to drive on. “I would never allow a bus with 50 people to stop just because I’m crossing the street” he says humbly and naturally. He asks me to join him for the opening exhibition, but I choose to thank him for the valuable time he has given me and decide to make my way home. I pick up the camera, and stroll along the streets, thinking “one picture at a time”.

More about Gunnar Smoliansky

1. Gunnar Smoliansky’s website
2. Gunnar Smoliansky’s book One picture at a time on amazon.com or adlibris.com
3. Leif Matsson’s article about Smoliansky (in Swedish)
4. Kulturhuset in Stockholm about Smoliansky (in Swedish)
5. Carl Abrahamson’s article about Smoliansky (in Swedish)
6. Hasselblad foundation about Smoliansky

The F-blog. January 16th, 2009. © Anders Blomqvist

Acknowledgements: The author wishes to thank Jeanne Wells, Lina Nääs, and Fredrik Skott for linguistic revision of the article.