Lev Ilizirov
Through photography, text, video and installation, I am dealing with my private life and my surrounding. Anything that happens on my way or goes in the same direction with me can be recorded. For me, my daily life and practice as a photographer are inseparable.
Manipulating photography is very similar to poetry and music. We can read photography as we read text. Sometimes to describe photography in literal way it makes it dry. If we just see at one of my pictures – picture of 'Legs' for example, we will just see picture of a man legs. This fact will not be interesting. But, we should look at the picture it self if we want to understand it. Photography as poetry do not deal only with fact, the fact is very simple – picture of legs. The beauty in poetry is the words but not the story. I also compare photography to music. As in music we know the notes. We can distinguish different string instruments one from another. We do not enjoy from this knowledge. Not from seven notes, and not from understanding what is create the sound. We like the sound it self, it's the connection between the notes. The musical composition is a combination of the same seven notes in different variations. As well in photography: not the color and not the light will give me the pleasure. They are as important as the notes in music. In photography it's the complete visual. We do not know who are the legs belongs to, why and where the picture was done. It is just a quatrain or a sound.
I began as a documentary photographer. In 2002, I followed a group of young rock musicians. From this, I realized the project "Asphalt" which is showing the life of Russian teenagers in Israel: their rituals and their way of life. In 2003 I moved to Jerusalem and then I focused my life, on my private surrounding and its routine. So I started to document it. My photography became my personal dairy. "Tea with lemon and double sugar" (2007) is one year of photography running through a video sequence of photos organized by chronological order. The sound it's my voice describing the situations around the photography. Some photographers makes me wonder about the ethics of photography. It is started when I was working as nurse in rehabilitation place for mentally sick people. I started to take pictures of them because it was part of my surrounding. I was tormented by the question - how do I want to see them. They are my friends, and I want to show their best side. I want to force the viewer to respect them more than sympathize with them and not to have mercy. This series is bounded into an artist book: "Hostel" (2007). Since the issue of ethics has taken most of my photography, the visual results changed. "Fade Out" (2009) is a very similar to "Tea with lemon double sugar": sequence with voice over. During the process of "Fade Out" I discovered that what matter in my work is the connection between the photography and my state of mind or mood. My feelings are affecting the formal qualities of my images. Their density, saturation and the content changed as my feelings are changing.
I seek to develop different ways of thinking about photography, through research and approaching issues of artistic and practical use of image. I examining the processes and challenges of photography archive and looking at photography in relation to these. In "Family Album" (2009), "Untitled Video One" (2010) and "9000/1" (2010) I try to present my work as a constant action in my life. Infinity - is important issue for me. Infinity talks about direction without a goal but based on a chain reaction between the causes and actions.
Project "Notebook" (2011) comes from a totally unplanned photos. It started when I was late to a store. I took the picture of schedule because I did not have a pencil. Later I found it very convenient way to take notes. I continued until I accumulated enough pictures for the new project. Content in "Notebook" is derived from an external practical reasons. Nevertheless I automatically thought about the beauty of image when photographing letters and numbers. In this project I am concerned about the issue – "what is aesthetic in photography?"