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f/5.6 Bright Moments

September 22 – December 31 2018

From 22 September till 21 December 2018 the Berlin based art gallery “Galerie Hilaneh von Kories” is presenting the photographic work of Polish filmmaker and photographer Bogdan Dziworski (*1941). He is one of the most important artists associated to the Polish avant garde and experimental cinema. For quite some time Dziworski developed a huge reputation as an image artist in his home country; whereas in Germany his work is almost completely unknown. Especially his photographic images are a fresh discovery to the German art scene. Since the 1960’s Bogdan Dziworski created a unique body of work, which often gave him the cognomen “Polish Cartier-Bresson”. Similar to the French photographer, Dziworski has a distinct aesthetic for the momentum and follows a humanistic approach in his photography. His images were all taken by no assignment and partly have never been exhibited in this particular selection of photographs.

Warszawa, 1964

His contrasty analogue black and white images deliver an insight into the everyday life of Polish cities during the second half of the 20th century. Although being taken over fifty years ago, the images do not appear to be nostalgic but are rather featured with a surprisingly timeless character. The urban diversity of streets and alleys offered the photographer the perfect stage to capture these lively motives. Hence, Dziworski photographed scenes from people’s everyday life: the young and the old, the beautiful and the ugly, the happy and also the sad - life is shown as a kaleidoscope of moments. Most of the images are determined by a joyful and light mood. Often, the children’s gestures and faces take centre stage in the motives, i.e. during the play out on the streets or even while taking the first steps of making a pass on someone. Every image is able to tell a story or anecdote which is either poetic or amusing. It is no wonder, that some motives look like Film Stills just taken out of a running video project. The images only appear to be taken by chance, though none of them are snapshots. The captured moments are precisely and consequently observed and are evocative of Henri Cartier-Bresson’s credo of the „decisive moment“. Yet, Dziworski’s images deploy a significant personal aesthetic in comparison to Cartier-Bresson’s photography. The directness of the gaze and the increased vitality of his motives capture the viewer’s imagination, especially the humorous and surreal bits create a fun and human aura around the images. Again and again it shows that nothing is as crazy, contradictory or unrealistic as what we experience as the real world.

Bogdan Dziworski: “My photography from that time was never staged. It is “ran to”. Day after day I photographed, sometimes up to eight hours. You need to wait for this precise moment, in which reality determines the stage. You need to be lucky. And I was.”

Biography:
Bogdan Dziworski was born on 8 December 1941 in Łódź, Poland. He studied at the local film university and since then made countless movies as a cinematographer, director and documentary filmmaker. Later he became the dean of the film university in Katowice. Since the 1980’s his photographic work shifted into the public focus. In the meantime he published numerous image books and was part of various exhibition projects. In 2017 the Leica Gallery Warsaw presented the broad retrospective “f/5.6” including an accompanying catalogue as a Polish-English edition, which is also available at our gallery in Berlin.

The current exhibition blends perfectly into the programme of Galerie Hilaneh von Kories, since the presentation of (newly) discovered photographic lifeworks has become a major important part of the gallery’s work. In the last few years the following amongst others were exhibited here: Sabine Weiss, Herbert Dombrowski, Bill Perlmutter, Wolf Suschitzky and Vivian Maier. The latter was a complete unknown representative of street photography during her first presentation in 2011 in Germany. It is also worth mentioning that after the success of Sabine Weiss’ exhibition at Galerie Hilaneh von Kories, Weiss is currently on display with a solo exhibition at the prestigious Centre Georges-Pompidou in Paris. The photographic work of Bogdan Dziworski in its variety and importance is yet to be discovered in Germany.

These publications are available in the gallery.

Bogdan Dziworski „f/5.6“

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