Saturday, September 30, 2006

Day Nine - "The Queen"




Thursday, September 28, 2006

Day Eight - "The Scream"




Loneliness is like a prison. Toxic love is like a vicious circle of obssesion and addiction - an even worst prison. Each way, the pressure is rising day after day up to the breaking point. Then, the painful outburst. But, what message it tells behind concrete walls of loneliness? Or within the invisible closed circle of cold madness? A scream for help that is never heard or always misunderstood...
The real love is the one that is letting you be who you really are.
If you love somebody, set them free...

Day Seven - "The Unbearable Lightness Of Being" (follow-up)











Day Seven - About the yellow light

Because an image is only one of the many faces of something I have seen - a memory of an image - I alter it according to what I remember I was feeling at the time the image was shot. Then, I combine it with the mood of the memories about the person depicted in the image. Very, very subjective process...
I sometimes feel like using this toxic, acid yet somehow nostalgic, ill and sad yellow tint. I replace the white in the picture with this industrial yellow. This happens when my memory about that image is saying: melancholy, sadness, acalmy, panic, loneliness, unknown fears...
See images bellow.
This young girl was dominated by the fear of becoming a loser - a poor waitress in a small country town. She deserved more than that - she was very kind, very polite, very fragile, soft and beautiful. But, unfortunately, she hadn't many chances to change her life...

Day Seven - "The Unbearable Lightness Of Being"



Remember the movie with the same name and the leading actress? Juliette Binoche. The same fragile and haunted looks... You can hardly can find eyes looking like that today

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Day Six - "One Very Important Thought"

"Now that the show is over and we have jointly exercised our constitutional rights, we would like to leave you with one very important thought.
Sometime in the future you may have the opportunity to serve as a juror in censorship cases - or so called obscenity cases.
It would be wise to remember that the same people who stop you from listening to "Boards Of Canada" may be back next year to complain about a book, or even a TV programm.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think.
Defend your constitutionally protected rights.
No one else would do it for you.
Thank you"

Michael Sandison & Marcus Eoin Sandison
Boards Of Canada


Day Six - Today's playlist

Muisc I have listened to today:

David Bowie - Outside (album)
David Bowie - Hours (album)
Andreas Vollenweider - Cosmopoly (album)
William Orbit - Strange Cargol Hinterland (album)
Nick Warren - Metrodance Headliners (part 1 & 2 mix)
Paul Van Dyke - Essential Mix
Nor Elle - Phantom Of Life (album)
Gatecrasher Experience - The Karma (album)
Jean Jaques Milteau - Fragile (album)
Sheila Chandra - Moonsung (album)
Talvin Singh - OK (album)
Jarre - Geometry Of Love (album)
Boards Of Canada - Music Has The Right To Children (album)

Plus
Anahata, Antonio Allah, Bruce Rutkovski, Clouds & Rain, Deosil, Hannag Orsley, Nicola Hitchcock, Origen, Jace Vek, Johannes Linstead, Joshua Peterson, Mars Lasar, Kawika Heftel, Massimo Migliosi, Noah Brion Richards, Psicodreamics, Quiet Mind Project, Rudi Tanzi, Sacred Spaces, Satya, Sebastian Nanek, Sleepwalker Project, SPIN ARTES (Romania), Taru, TLOM, Rasika, Erich Netherton

Day Six - "A Sensitive Kind"

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Day Five - "Winter Afternoon"

Day Five - "The Muse"

Day Five - "Friday Afternoon"

Monday, September 25, 2006

Day Five - "No control"


David Bowie - "No Control" ("Outside" album)

Stay away from the future / Back away from the light
It's all deranged - no control
Sit tight in your corner / Don't tell God your plans
It's all deranged
No control

If I could control tomorrow's haze / The darkened shore wouldn't bother me
If I can't control / the web we weave
My life will be lost in the fallen leaves

Every single move's uncertain / Don't tell God your plans
It's all deranged
No control

I should live my life on bended knee / If I can't control my destiny
You've gotta have a scheme / You've gotta have a plan
In the world of today, for tomorrow's man

No control

Stay away from the future / Don't tell God your plans
It's all deranged / No control

Forbidden words, deafen me / In memory, no control
See how far a sinful man / Burns his tracks, his bloody robes

You've gotta have a scheme / You've gotta have a plan
In the world of today, for tomorrow's man

I should live my life on bended knee / If I can't control my destiny
No control I can't believe
I've no control
It's all deranged

I can't believe I've no control
It's all deranged
Deranged
Deranged

Day Four - Naked eyes



In this impure world, the random and unexpected moments of purity are sometimes seen as flashes of kind madness...

Sunday, September 24, 2006

Day Three - Naked

Naked doesn't necessarily means naked skin. For me naked sometimes means the purity of a certain look, expression, gesture, movement, feeling, action... as I see it at a certain moment. I ask my models to be natural and honest, to let themselves be true, uninhibited - even they are naked, half naked or fully dressed. Naked is also sincerity.
This 4 new images previously uploaded are showing this, I think.

And one more thing. I gave-up analog imaging (negatives, slides) in 2002, when I bought my first digital camera. Apart from many objective and subjective reasons, one stands out as TRUE: it doesn't matter what type of material the artist is using to create and communicate his vision. You can create art out of almost everything as long as you have a vision transformed by artistical means into valuable messages for peoples. The history of art proved this many times. So, the conception that analog photography is more "noble" than digital imaging is pure bull-shit. Crap. Snobbery. Narrow-mind. Digital imaging is simply another artistic option. And I don't believe also in that stupid theory about "major arts" and "minor arts". There is art or no-art. The time will tell...

Day Three - Women





Saturday, September 23, 2006

Day Two - Moments


The title of the book is "Women" by Charles Bukowski...



Day Two - "The Lost Girl" (2005)


She is a very talented artist. She is wonderful. We use to be very good friends. But we lost that friendship. I am so sorry. But somehow I feel that we will start over again, sometime. There is an old Arabian saying: "The one who stops being your friend was never really your friend". Well, I think it is true, but in this case, even we didn't talked for about a half of year, I feel that she didn't stop being my friend. For sure, I didn't. But for now, she is "The Lost Girl". I miss her... Anyway, this image is not posted hoping that she will see it. It is posted for itself, for what it tells about this woman.

Day Two - Before & after party (2005)


Day Two - "Morning Light"


This image was taken on film on the same day as "The Piano Lesson". She put on her favourite music and then simply went to the huge windows and just sit there on that chair enjoying the sun light on her body.

Day Two - Eat Me!

Day Two - Another kind of nakedness...

Friday, September 22, 2006

Day Two - Credo

This blog it is about writing with images - image stories written about peoples, generally, but mainly about the most rich and fascinating human being: THE WOMAN. Because She is the beginning and the end. Because she is superior to man. Because She means Beauty. So, it will be about HER-story, rather than HIS-story. Or, an image history about HERstory as I am living it.
A true artistic image tells more than it shows. Only this way an image becomes a carrier for the message designed by the artist.
I think the most complete, true, honest and vivid portrait of a woman is her whole body, nude, with all the signs of her feminity. The most complete portrait of a woman is the portrait of her naked body. This is true for me, this is my belief, this is what I do.
I work only in natural light. Natural light means for me the existent quantity of light in a certain location at a certain moment. This could be sun-light, neon light, tungsten light or flash: the window, the lamp, the neon tube in the ceiling, a candle-light, a flash-light or in certain cases the camera flash.
I remember the good old days in the art high-school when we use to sketch, draw, paint or model in clay. We worked simply in the natural light coming from the big windows. It is then when I learned the natural light is magic and enough - because it is true and honest and authentic. Natural light belongs to the reality. Artificial light belongs to the dreams reality. It is a perfect valid artistic option. The only problem with that is this dreams are always ours - they are not the dreams of my female models. Working with sophisticated artificial light is what the artist is imagining about the model. Working with natural light is who the woman posing for you really is.
Natural light means naked. Artificial light means dressed, even when the model is naked. Because the model is dressed with the preconceived image from the artist's head. Artificial light means covering and correcting what the artist consider not to belong to his vision. Natural light means freeing the model to express who she really is from within.
This is my option.
I do not search the perfect (anatomic) beauty. I search the highest point of emotion in admiring a female naked body. I look at her through my lenses and when I feel the peaks of the emotion waves inside me I push the button. These are the magic moments.
A woman has maybe 60 different expressions during a minute. Its is up to the artist to catch the magic ones.
I work only with the women that I like, regardless their anatomy status. I do not like the perfect but cold anatomy of statues. I do not like the women who are using their enhanced anatomical beauty just to hide who they really are. Many of them are using their beauty as an armour. I rather prefer the beauty as a weapon, instead as a defenisve system.
I do not hire models for making nudes. I work only with women that I became friend with. And this takes time. But what a great reward!
For me the true beauty is the way a female body carries itself through space guided by her true self.
This digital image was shot on a very hot summer day in 2004. It was so hot outside that the whole park was absolutely empty.
And that's all for now.
P.S.
I will not write that much in the future. I explained all these only now, only once. In the future I will write only about things I cannot capture in images.

Day Two

Rainy autumn day. Grey light. Wet air, but so fresh. But birds singing somewhere nearby are so cheerful...
Still sleepy, she get out of the bed and went to the window...
No, this is not happening this morning. It happened 3 years ago, but I feel the atmosphere of this image is perfect for today's morning. I named the image "Brand new day". It was shot with my first digital camera - a fantastic camera - a Sony F 717.



And now is time for making coffee. "The Morning Coffee" was shot on film, in 2001, in a tiny poor kitchen. But a very good morning coffee in a rainy grey autumn day makes you feel "king for a day".




And while enjoying the hot black coffee, music comes into your mind. Maybe it is because of the rain. For sure it is because of the mood that autumn morning puts you in. "The Piano Lesson" was shot on film, in 2002.

Day One - A Brief History

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Day One

The name of this blog is "digital_sessions". This is the title of my first compact photography book published by DAAB gmbh (Koln, Germany) in 2005. I want to express my deepest respect and admiration for Ralf DAAB, the founder and owner of DAAB Publishing. Ralf found the title of the book and I think it is a good line not only for the book, but also extended to my whole creation. He believed more than me in the potential success of "digital_sessions" and he was right. My book was sold all over the world. I think the most important thing is that peoples from different cultural areas decided to take the book home. This means Ralf was right: my images are telling the right stories. And I am more than content that my artistic message passed different cultural frontiers reaching so many peoples.
You can find here the link to Daab and their exquisite site.
And here is the cover of "digital_sessions".

I create images. I think it doesn't matter what the camera is capturing in a certain moment. The only important thing is what the artist decides to show in the end - what IMAGE of the initial IMAGE. The artist is showing A MEMORY of the image created before.
There are things that can be captured in images. And there are things that can be expressed only in words. I do both.
I found that is very hard to choose the first image for this blog. I have many on-going image projects, but in the end I decided to start with a certain portrait. It was shot in the autumn of 2005 and it is called "Lolita". I discovered her when she was only 14 and a half, in the summer of 2004 at seaside. Since then I captured her special beauty every year. And I will do so until she will be 20 - when her "teenager time" will be over...


I will finish my first post in this blog by quoting a character - "The Professor" - played by American actor Richard Farnsworth in Sydney Pollack's movie Havana. He is telling Robert Redford: "Woman is THE BEST. Everything else is bullshit". And I think he is right.