i wanna talk about one issue i have been confronting myself with a lot: what makes a photo a photo.

i knooow it is a ridiculous question. it was motivated by looking at my recent negatives, paying attention on that first frame, which we never make consciously (you know the process: after loading the camera you press the button 3 times, so you won’t click on already exposed film). the labs where i took my negatives to be developed and scanned, never scanned it. and the images are simply beautiful. why don’t they consider these images?! why did I never consider them? aren’t they photos?

and then i was brought to questions of authorship: are these beautiful images mine? i didn’t take them, i was not looking at the viewfinder, i didn’t measure the light, i did nothing.

still, i am in love with them.

weinbergspark

neukölln

prenzlauer berg

prenzlauer berg

on authorship, i have something else to say: the great russian writer gogol had his themes suggested by puchkin. and it doesn’t mean at all gogol’s novels and short stories weren’t great. he mastered his craft. he was inspired and pushed by puchkin’s (haha) suggestions and created out of it. what makes me unquiet on these images is, therefore, the fact that they are result of chance – they are not my creation, as gogol’s novels were his’.

and there are more elements against me: the image owner is not the one who presses the button and our beloved cindy sherman is here to prove. but for loving my pictures made by chance, i just name myself a lucky author.

i will keep searching and scanning them.