Roadsides scenes II
… reality is a matter of energy. Energy flowing between “us”. The phenomenon of photography is the energy of light reflected from the “object” and falling “on the photographer” – a human individual, living, from the point of view of the cosmos, a fraction of a second and sensitive to the world around him. The photographs in this exhibition are a photochemical, aesthetic response to this “impact” of reality. Empty buildings, decaying farm barns, proving the existence of another time. The shriveled tree branches, abandoned by the leaves of last autumn, which, like a theatrical set, cover the wall of the old building. Perception of reality “from the side” – in a split second – the purpose of photography. What becomes important is the IMAGE. Authentic, existing regardless of the moment of its disclosure. Jakgy not remembering that the reason for its creation was about a specific place and time. As if the objectively existing reality was irrelevant. It did not last forever. Photographs do not seem to hold objects “towards eternity”. They do not take “ownership” of them. They let their existence flow freely between perception and registration. Photography seems to leave them in their places, as if they could die peacefully in their own “real” world, without leaving a trace. And this, perhaps, is what makes these photographs special… After all, to see does not always mean to stop….
These are crumbling old warehouses, a chapel forgotten by people hidden somewhere in the woods. But also a decaying, foxy street, today and now somewhere in a Polish town. Empty photographs, recording a reality that will be gone in a moment, vanished from the face of the earth swept away by modern architecture. No one cares about this world anymore, it’s not worth it, after all, there’s nothing fascinating about observing a dumpster. Marcin Seweryn Andrzejewski’s Roadside Scenes are photographs of the garbage dump of civilization. A consistent documentation of what is old unnecessary, forgotten, destroyed and yet beautiful. But still, the most important thing is the image. What has been captured has suddenly acquired a different meaning, a different significance. For it so happens that even the most banal object, an ordinary stone, a crumbling wall of a house noticed and photographed ceases to be anonymous. It becomes something unique, chosen. A process of artistic sacaralization of banal objects takes place. Reality, which in a moment will no longer be there, is stopped forever. In a way, photography takes the photographed object into another dimension, a dimension of the universe. Now already crumbling walls, lonely shrines can go away into oblivion, oblivion, non-existence. After all, these objects will exist – with a different life and in a different space. But they will.
Wojciech Zawadzki
