author: Mateusz Maliszewski
author: Jarosław Wiśniewski
Eight names,
eight individuals, common aim - street photography. The street and people on
the street: ordinary passers-by, streetworkers, suppliers of goods, the
homeless, sexy ladies in high heels,
drug addicts, thieves, street prophets filled with the mission, preachers,
gays, lost nonentities - full democracy only.
There is exactly a smell or tink
of the street which it is necessary to catch - energy which we need to freeze
and to stop just for a moment. Of course
we tried to create the manifesto, but who is reading manifestos today?
Who is interested in an art, in her problems and complexity. People have their
own problems - children, school, their illnesses. As a matter of fact they
prefer to listen to the Despacito than The third Symphony of Henryk Mikołaj Górecki. That is why it is
simply necessary to make photos or better to say produce photos. That is why we created working group
-photographic manufactory which would be able to produce most valuable street
photographs, because there is no more democratic place than the street. If you
want to meet the world – you have to to dress a warm sweater or jacket and just
go. There, for a while, we run away from the family, from our own obsessions,
often from the confused past, we are not so lonely and sometimes doubly lonely
in the unconscious crowd. Each exit is a separate fight, which is accompanied
by the same ambivalence of feelings.
Author: Grzegorz Milewski
Author. Jacek Szlak
Working
group, even better to say -photographic manufactory. Old strange word. We still
remember beautiful young Tess of Roman Polański, textile Łódź and we know the
expression workingman’s
death. Once there people born and are died.
But somebody is able to die for the photography today? I doubt, but
street photographers are most exposed to blows. We knows about it from: Suzanne Stein from Los Angeles, Eric Kim,
Bruce Gilden, Salvatore Matarazzo and other street champions. Richard Koci
Hernandez – iphone virtuoso said: I am not going to die for 25 bucks, because I
am selling my mobile copies for such
price. But who is able to predict the future
and what will become round the corner?
Author: Mirek Górski
Author: Jakub Baczyński
Of course we often
met criticism in the street. We met curses, simple ignorance, and ordinary
criminals trying to steal our equipment. We also remember nice surprises and wonderful meetings with unusual
people. If its everything well there is no reason to start unnecessary discussions. We aren't journalists, social
workers or street skirt-chasers after all. After long conversations, we agreed, that photographer - a customer
engineer, a wizard, a heartbreaker aren't a street photographer, but a crummy
film director which isn't able to create the plot for his film. We stick to the
idea.
Author: Karina Wisz
Author: Mariusz Klunder
And now
step by step about us:
Karina
Wisz, born 1976 Cracow. He is aproaching close. Through her glasses, she gives
the impression of having trouble with her eyes and barely read the timetable.
In the hands of Iphone SE, Iphone7 or Ricoh GR II and the real hunter's
instinct. She is the only person from Poland and probably in the world who four
times got to the final finale of 1415BestOfTheWeek. In her photographs you can
see the victims of Metropolis: businessmen in short suits, homeless, elderly
ladies who often have personal happiness and great love behind. There are also
kids with sweet naivety and the first sadness of childhood. Thanks to numerous
trips to Frankfurt, Istanbul, Marrakech, Prague - a great deal of the faces and
human history. Huge progress in a short period of time - a real street
predator.
Jakub
Baczyński born in 1979. Lives and works in Warsaw. As an overworked architect
with international successes, he is painfully affected each day by his
responsibility for the profession of public trust. It necessarily exudes the
"sock-jar" smell of the capital's smog. It is he who is behind the
design of a block of the famous incineration plant on the outskirts of Nowa
Huta, also known as the Thermal Waste Recycling Facility in Krakow, which was
later awarded by SARP in 2016. He is an ambassador of the worldwide documentary
project 24Hourproject, belongs to the Mobile Photo Trip association. His
photographs are combination: mathematics and poetry. Looking at a woman wiping
her four-legged pet, Jakub looks for subconsciously lines and colors that are a
common denominator for the world of living and street dummies. Reflections in
the windows, sweet pas cherries, colorful street humor, small paradoxes. Just
like in Chekhov's short stories. The small Fuji X70 with a hinged screen helps
Jakub accumulate these bittersweet moments, the crumbs of life.
Grzegorz Milewski born in 1976 in Cracow. How alone laconically he is talking about himself - is interested in man and his history. One can see it, are heard and to feel at his works. It's safe to say that it is an essence of classical street photography, where the motive, the situation, the man and keeping it are most important. Grzegorz loves the street and people who live there. Relating to other photographers of the street one very important feature is still singling him out - sense of humour. With ease he is inventing situations tinged with absurd mood in the borderland anecdotes. However his sense of humour is warm, better to say like comic stories of Bohumil Hrabal. Grzegorz is very close to the photographed people. One can see, that isn't afraid to enter interaction with photographed persons. Some of them seem to pose. However they are natural, probably disarmed with the frankness and the modesty of the author. However Milewski is changeable. Ricoh GR II and the big contrast let him achieve distance. In his last works he directs the lens between people, to small gestures, to the space between. Postomdernism? Expressionism? Not, this is the maturing and maturity of the conscious creator.
Mateusz
Maliszewski. Generation 1986. Charnobyl effect
- how he is talking with irony about himself. He comes from Gliwice. His
photographs are a specific chronicle of Silesian living: ordinary passers-by,
neighbours at straight duties - specific poetry of the everyday day, warm,
toned down, often shy, almost always full of the broad humour. With his simple
phone Samsung Galaxy Prime Mateusz try to follow Jan Czypionka and Michał Cała
- great masters of the photography from Upper Silesia.
Mariusz Klunder
born in 1972. Lives and
works in Szczecin. Autodidact -drawing knowledge from old photographs.He once mentioned that he has a
hereditary developer in his blood, and a snapshot instead. You can immediately
see that he loves the simplicity and pronunciation of black and white street
shots. Armed with small camera Panasonic GM1 and Iphone 7, Mariusz explores,
however, different spaces - vestibules of shops, office waiting rooms, hospital
interiors. His street exceeds the usual boundaries of the road and pavement. It
penetrates through walls to places often marked by internal pain and suffering.
His heroes in stoic style,
have successive internal victories over body limitation and disease.
Mirek
Górski born in 1975 – 20 km in a straight line from the border with Ukraine.
Grew up in Silesia. Its character is a resultant of both mentality. Domesticated
nostalgia and the need for mysticism comes from Ukrainian part of his soul,
spontaneity and reliability comes from Silesia. He is the administrator and
chef of the photo services @Capturestreets, @grupamobilni and the originator of the very black Deep
Black Magazine @deepblackmag. He likes to sing, dance, drink
vodka, to be high, to drive fast, to feel adrenaline, to get lost. His works
shows him as a mature photographer, aware of itself, open to light and
darkness.
Jacek Szlak
comes from Bieszczady mountains and based in Cracow. A valued marketing
specialist. Since 2003, he has been running the Marketing at Coffee service. A
publicist dealing with marketing communication and the art of advertising.
Observer of new phenomena in mass culture, marketing and new media. Lecturer in
postgraduate studies in the field of internet advertising, content marketing
and storytelling. One of the co-authors of the book /The practice of branding/
and the author of the book "Storytelling in marketing". He searches
for patterns and symbols in everyday life. He tries to fix in the pictures
something that persists unconscious beyond the limits of his perception. A type
of puritan, easily obsessive. Obsession in street photography is time for him.
This time, when the record of a passing moment turns into a composition with
internal dynamics and a set of references - not necessarily to the world of
photography, but to the entire cultural universe. On a daily basis, he works
with the text as an editor, photography restores his soul to balance, and
sometimes the opposite - he conflicts with the world for good. These references
to the world of advertising, street billboards became the trademark of the
author. In this world there are almost no more trees and vegetation, and
ordinary passers-by have become more or less conscious extras in the street
game of corporations and economic tycoons.
Jarosław
Wiśniewski born in 1974 in Cracow. Translator from Russian, author of stage
plays and film scripts: /Asinara/ about the last generation of terrorists from
Red Brigades, /My friend -Issei/ about the internet friendship of the student
with the psychopathic murderer./Guantanamo/
about the
ex guardian of the most dangerous islamic terrorists who returns to his
homeland in Apallachian mountains and try to rebuild his personal life. He is painting and collects folk
art. From 2017 co-founder 1708 st Street Working Group, until recently he published in leading photo magazines where he showed works of forgotten
champions of photography and made promotion of young talents - mainly from
Europe, Middle East and Japan. In his street cycles: Midnight rendezvous, Deep
black intervals, Cracovian spleen shows human alienation in scenery of the big
city. After a decade of a
break under influence history and culture of Japan, he returns to dramaturgy
with stage play Hiropon about closed group of scientists from Atomic Bomb
Casualty Commision studying the effects of a nuclear explosion in destroyed and
possessed by drug gangs -Hiroshima. Leading Hollywood authors David Franzoni
and Eric Roth just writing the movie
script for Miramax Pictures /H.Returning wave/ based on his last play.
Katowice
2017 r. street meeting in Katowice 1708ST. Top: Jacek Szlak, Grzegorz
Milewski, Mateusz Maliszewski. Bottom: Jakub Baczyński, Jarosław
Wiśniewski, Mirek Górski, Karina Wisz
All right reserved. Jarosław Wiśniewski -text, members of 1708ST - photographs.