Survivors
photography on black and white film 120, 2016 – ongoing
The symbol of tree has prevailed in European mythology as a representation of life, wisdom and growth. The roots resemble the branches and this likeness connects the underground with the sky. They reveal a dualism in the vertical organization of the world, suggesting rising and falling, brightness and darkness, freedom in the vast space and nestling in the solid ground. However, the complexity goes beyond the vertical axis. While the branches seem to be enfolding, the surface of the stem could be degenerating. These surfaces bear the marks of time, storms and changes which trees silently survive. Being explored by these marks, scars and deformations, they appear as old stoic observers witnessing the evolution of humankind.
The nature is photographed as a metaphor of challenging psychological events, whose intensity rarely arrives at a veritable outer expression. On the contrary, the deformations of trees are strongly visible on the surface and express distortions in life in a disturbing, but yet, aesthetically appealing forms.