When did I start taking pictures?
Wait! Isn't it the question that they always ask you when you hold a camera or an exhibition? You should have a template answer already. Would that be: when I was very young father gave me his Zenith E to take a picture of a ferry on the sea? I was about 4 or 5. Or maybe it was when I first took it on my own and started shooting with a bit more consciousness? Or maybe when I started thinking and writing about photography? How does it sound? I've read it so many times in all sorts of interviews that it makes me sick to even think of it. All of it would be a lie anyway. I've never really started taking pictures. I am still just observing.
What was my first camera?
It was my mind that started constructing possible scenarios and contexts that I could, and I did, use photography for. Really it was Russian Zenith E with Helios lens. Later I tore it apart and, of course, never put it back. I have learnt something tho.
Why do I take pictures?
Well, I don't. I do observe and take whatever I need from existing reality to create my own reality with my own contexts. Then I may use photography for installations, on-the-wall show or a book, you name it. In Singapore my pictures were on the floor and people could walk on it. I do not like putting pictures on the walls. They always have a story behind them and I do not believe picture on itself can say everything. People trying to interpret images with a title Untitled 1 may get into all sorts of conclusions that are nowhere near what the story is about. Anytime I see conceptual picture with such a title I need to go to the loo, in order not to piss in a public. Photography is also a way of expressing certain ideas which are often misinterpreted because of the reliability issue that messes up photography since Bertillon. We believe in images more than in words and this is quite dangerous.
Wait! Isn't it the question that they always ask you when you hold a camera or an exhibition? You should have a template answer already. Would that be: when I was very young father gave me his Zenith E to take a picture of a ferry on the sea? I was about 4 or 5. Or maybe it was when I first took it on my own and started shooting with a bit more consciousness? Or maybe when I started thinking and writing about photography? How does it sound? I've read it so many times in all sorts of interviews that it makes me sick to even think of it. All of it would be a lie anyway. I've never really started taking pictures. I am still just observing.
What was my first camera?
It was my mind that started constructing possible scenarios and contexts that I could, and I did, use photography for. Really it was Russian Zenith E with Helios lens. Later I tore it apart and, of course, never put it back. I have learnt something tho.
Why do I take pictures?
Well, I don't. I do observe and take whatever I need from existing reality to create my own reality with my own contexts. Then I may use photography for installations, on-the-wall show or a book, you name it. In Singapore my pictures were on the floor and people could walk on it. I do not like putting pictures on the walls. They always have a story behind them and I do not believe picture on itself can say everything. People trying to interpret images with a title Untitled 1 may get into all sorts of conclusions that are nowhere near what the story is about. Anytime I see conceptual picture with such a title I need to go to the loo, in order not to piss in a public. Photography is also a way of expressing certain ideas which are often misinterpreted because of the reliability issue that messes up photography since Bertillon. We believe in images more than in words and this is quite dangerous.
What did I achieve so far.
Nothing really that I would be 100% happy with. I've got couple of MA degrees (Social and Cultural Animation w/ Film&Photo and Applied Imagination). I've had many exhibitions all over the world. No, not on the web. By the way, once I thought virtual galleries are the future, then everybody seemed to have the same thought and it turned out very badly. Anyway. I took part in few festivals(Singapore International Photography Festival, Friesland New Media, FocFest, In Transition: Russia) my works were on shows in major museums and galleries(e.g National Centres for Contemporary Arts in Yekaterinburg and Moscow I like it because it is so long and I still haven't been there) and I also had some publications: either my writings or my pictures were admired. On the other hand I don't think I have a commercial aim and I am really shit in selling and showing off. So I haven't sold anything. Well, I think I wouldn't say I did.
What sort of photography am I into?
I don't think I am into any photography at all. This is just the tool I am using and the methodology that comes with it. I used to say it is a conceptual photography, but then I saw so much crap and I do not want to be part of it anymore. I am doing quite well on my own, in a kind of sociopathic way. I do occasionally write about photography because I think it is a kind of reality-cutter, which allows constructing new external realities and use it to confront the existing reality. I still agree with myself on this one. One thing I really envy is journalism, a proper Bresson photography. I am too slow and too shy to shoot into someone's face. Patience is another thing. I got distracted easily. And this does not leave much time to think what I really wanted to say. I want to use pictures to say something, not to have them to use me. Although both strategies seem to be too easy and it is true only when you are on the other side.
Adam Buczek was speakign to himself. Again.
Nothing really that I would be 100% happy with. I've got couple of MA degrees (Social and Cultural Animation w/ Film&Photo and Applied Imagination). I've had many exhibitions all over the world. No, not on the web. By the way, once I thought virtual galleries are the future, then everybody seemed to have the same thought and it turned out very badly. Anyway. I took part in few festivals(Singapore International Photography Festival, Friesland New Media, FocFest, In Transition: Russia) my works were on shows in major museums and galleries(e.g National Centres for Contemporary Arts in Yekaterinburg and Moscow I like it because it is so long and I still haven't been there) and I also had some publications: either my writings or my pictures were admired. On the other hand I don't think I have a commercial aim and I am really shit in selling and showing off. So I haven't sold anything. Well, I think I wouldn't say I did.
What sort of photography am I into?
I don't think I am into any photography at all. This is just the tool I am using and the methodology that comes with it. I used to say it is a conceptual photography, but then I saw so much crap and I do not want to be part of it anymore. I am doing quite well on my own, in a kind of sociopathic way. I do occasionally write about photography because I think it is a kind of reality-cutter, which allows constructing new external realities and use it to confront the existing reality. I still agree with myself on this one. One thing I really envy is journalism, a proper Bresson photography. I am too slow and too shy to shoot into someone's face. Patience is another thing. I got distracted easily. And this does not leave much time to think what I really wanted to say. I want to use pictures to say something, not to have them to use me. Although both strategies seem to be too easy and it is true only when you are on the other side.
Adam Buczek was speakign to himself. Again.