alexander walmsley / michal semczyszyn
a visual dialogue
For this dialogue we invited Michal Semczyszyn and Alexander Walmsley whose projects were featured in see-zeen #2. Their curiosity for expanding image making possibilities and the deeply thoughtful way they approach their very disparate photographic practices prompted us to pair them up and in this resulting work we see them both come out of their comfort zone. Happy they accepted the challenge, we now present the results of the match.
Alexander
I like this image because in my mind it formed a bridge between the previous photo project I have been working on (in see-zeen #2) and the first conversation I had with Michal where we discussed our respective approaches to our work. So it seemed like a good one with which to open the dialogue and explore some new territory.
Michal
At first I thought that Alex's image was a funny joke. A police tape with ‘Do not enter - a crime scene’ written repeatedly all over it and wrapped around an advert of a Mini. Is it a crime to be selling Minis that cheap? Then, I thought about the image in the context of negative space - a theme we’ve agreed to explore during our dialogue. A crime scene is a space inaccessible to some, but not all. I liked that ambiguity.
I started photographing my fingertips - one of the most obvious symbols of the crime scene - and used a few of the pictures to create a landscape where one of the fingertips, like the sun, starts to set on the horizon, above the large black negative space.
Alexander
For me, the black space in Michal’s image was not negative space, but rather one where the elements are so densely overlapping that they can’t be defined any longer. With this photograph I was particularly interested in exploring overlapping elements in the environment and in the frame. This image was taken by my flat after a storm had emptied the trees of leaves.
Michal
The old have to die to make space for the young. That is the first thought that came to my mind when I saw Alex’s image. Small trees, flexible and full of life, and the one in the middle - old, wrinkly and cut down. And also the fallen leaves. Tears over the remains of the dead? Or just a sign of an inevitable change?
I thought - what if the old one doesn’t want to let go of the land? What if its branches spread out and block others' access to the sun? And what if it isn’t a tree, but a human shaped figure, wandering through a wasteland. Would anything new grow there higher than a few inches above the ground?
Alexander
The silhouettes in Michal's image grew on me almost like characters in a narrative, so I set out to find some more silhouetted characters on the horizon.
Michal
Alex’s image reminded me of my previous one - just a zoomed out version of it. It was almost monochromatic too. I thought that his vision of the world is more optimistic though. People walking in pairs, babies in strollers, bicycles… Yes, they were depicted in black, but somehow felt happy.
At first, it reminded me of traveling by train, especially at night, and looking out the window at blocks of flats. I would search for windows with lights turned on, so I could see the interior, sometimes even a person living in a flat, and try to imagine what their life is like. Then I remembered the opening sequence of the ‘Wings of Desire’ - a Wim Wenders film - where an angel flies above Berlin (nota bene the city where Alex lives) also looking at people through the windows of their flats. I became obsessed with that image and tried to construct it in my reply.
Alexander
I was in Warsaw for a weekend at the beginning of December, and was struck by the monument to the Warsaw Uprising, which seems somewhere between a Classical temple and a City bank. Michal tells me the glass building behind the monument is in fact the Court of Appeal, the setting for recent judicial debates between the EU and Poland.
Michal
The building of the Supreme Court in Warsaw, Poland. I wasn’t sure if Alex was aware of the recent controversy about judicial system changes in Poland that triggered a dispute between The European Union and the Polish government. I didn’t want to start a political debate though and looked for more universal themes embedded in Alex’s image.
The dark shadow of the pillar reflected in the windows made me think of being followed. Security cameras made me think of being observed. And the symbol of justice made me think of being judged. What if, I thought, instead of being observed, I became an observer myself? An observer with the ultimate power, deciding on matters of life and death…
Alexander
I took direct inspiration from the UFO-like quality of Michal’s image for this photograph. I also wanted to find something explicitly humorous as a counterpoint to the previous image, about which I felt there was something darker.
Michal
The expression on the kite’s face was amusing and made me laugh. I am destined to race with the wind and now I’m stuck. And when it gets darker and they turn on the lights, this lamp will make me go blind!
To be honest, just like this kite, I also got stuck. I wanted to portray something funny, but nothing funny came to my mind. Ideas were disappearing before they took any shape I could recognise. My head was empty. And then, finally, I’ve come to a realization that I could try to picture that state of stagnation, emptiness, and being stuck.
Alexander
Michal’s image seemed to me to be referencing something very specific, while the image itself remained somewhat abstract. For me, it was like a footprint or an impression of something that is no longer there. This led me to my next image, taken in my local area.
Michal
I really liked the idea of photographing a space where a specific object existed in the past, but is no longer there. Does the image try to depict the empty space itself, or make you think about the object - bring up its memory or make you imagine how it looked when it was still in its place?
I started thinking about the nature of memory and how unreliable it can be, hence my image, constructed from a photo of an old photograph, where details of the upper body parts of two people are all merged into a blurry mass, their faces - hidden in darkness, and feet - melted into the ground.
Following the collaboration we asked Alexander and Michal about the experience.
Describe the collaborative process with a total stranger.
Michal: The best thing about working with a total stranger is that you don’t have any preconceived assumptions about their work. You don’t try to interpret their images based on your knowledge of their thought process, ways of working, typical behaviors or emotions. You look at their work, assign your own meaning to it, and then, when you play it back to them, very often they discover something new and surprising.
Alexander: Michal and I had a conversation at the beginning where we spent some time talking about our respective approaches, but during the actual working period only contacted one another to send our photos. For me, there was certainly some tension between the collaborative process of creating the dialogue vs. the actual isolation of creating the photographs. At times I found it more helpful to think of the photos I was making as a separate work - but even in these cases, bringing them together with Michal's images gave them a new context and a new meaning. Often what I thought I had been trying to say in one image looked very different after Michal had sent back his image - what he had responded to was different to what I had seen in the image.
How did the visual dialogue affect your work?
Michal: The visual dialogue inspired me to experiment with new approaches to photography and find new directions for my work. Alex's images, so rich in meaning, were a great trigger for my own explorations. With almost every image I have discovered a new technique: using macro shots of my own body, manipulating pictures of old photographs, or trying to construct a narrative scene with fairly abstract objects.
Alexander: Michal's images are so different from the kind I usually make - this led me at the beginning to respond primarily to the formal composition of the images, this being the element that I found most easy to access. As the dialogue went on, however, I became more comfortable with reading the images and began to respond more freely. With this came increased curiosity and more motivation to seek out different conditions, different streets, different times of day etc.
How will it affect the way you work, or think about making work in the future?
Michal: By now, most of my works are considered abstract art. During the visual dialogue I have moved a little bit closer to figuration. I don’t want to fully abandon abstraction, but entering the blurry line somewhere between abstraction and figuration, especially when trying to portray people, sounds really compelling to me. In fact, one of the images from the visual dialogue has recently become a starting point for a whole new ‘portraits’ series.
Alexander: I have often found it useful to work with certain restrictions - whether that of a theme, a geographical area, certain colors etc. However, the act of directly responding to someone else's work makes you cede control over these restrictions to someone else. In practice, this meant I often left the apartment with no clear idea of where I was going or how long I would be gone - just with the thought of having to find something with which to respond. As an exercise, this is something I would certainly like to take forward. That, and simply the frequency of shooting. Finding the time to get out regularly is often difficult - the dialogue certainly helped.
Alexander Walmsley @alexander.walmsley
Michal Semczyszyn @michalsemczyszyn