Paper Light

This series was born of the encounter between the famous phrase of Garry Winogrand, "I photograph to find out what the world looks like in a photograph", and my appreciation of that which, up till now, is my favorite medium for printing photographs, the Hahnemühle Photo Rag 308 gsm paper. I began to print my work on cotton paper in 2009, and the beginning of this experience was marked by an impact of discovery and satisfaction, a truly sensuous enchantment (as is so common for photographers) with the paper’s physical characteristics: its weight, texture, size and color, and the fascinating result of the image printed on its surface, offering a unique sense of depth. Having such appreciation for that object made me want to apply Winogrand’s sentence to it. I wanted to photograph Photo Rag 308 paper to see what it would look like in a photograph. This was at the very first moment of the project, and right after that – a natural stage in photography – I became interested in seeing how Photo Rag 308 paper, photographed, would look printed on… Photo Rag 308 paper, in what seemed to me a curious interplay of encounter, fusion, deposition of photo image and its referent, modulated only by the quality and quantity of light – quantity which I varied during the exposures. At the heart of the project, there is also the desire to keep the elements used to a minimum, employing just light and paper, which are necessary to the exposure and later presentation on a physical support. [In the framed prints, I leave the unprinted area around the printed image visible.]