Issue 13

Levan Kakabadze / $emiotext / Jean-Claude Delalande / Charlotte Quentin / Hélène Gauchou / Yumiko Kayukawa / Jean-Christophe Sartoris / Gusclock / Pamela Klaffke / Lolita Picco / Fabien Basmaison / Juan / Alain Etchepare / The Traps

ISSUE 130110

S U M M A R Y

SHADOWS

MINE DE RIEN

COLORS

EXTRAITS

HIDE

CHILDHOOD

CITIZEN

Levan Kakabadze INTERVIEW of the artist $emiotext « TENTATIVES » Jean-Claude Delalande INTERVIEW of the illustrator Charlotte Quentin Hélène Gauchou INTERVIEW of the artist Yumiko KAYUKAWA « TE SOUVIENS-TU QUAND TU AVAIS LES CHEVEUX LONGS ? » Jean-Christophe Sartoris INTERVIEW of the artist Gusclock « BESTIA PARVULUS » Pamela Klaffke INTERVIEW of the artist Lolita Picco « XÏNZHÀI » Fabien Basmaison INTERVIEW of the artist Juan « LA GRANDE VILLE» Alain Etchepare INTERVIEW of the band « The Traps »

SHADOWS

&

Levan Kakabadze INTERVIEW of the artist $emiotext

L E V A N K A K A B A D Z E

INTERVIEW HOW DO YOU START PHOTOGRAPHY? I began photography in very typical form, I was always interested in visual, I was studying film directing, and I was asked to tell story in 6 shots and later I used my friend’s camera and began shooting.

A HUMANIST PHOTOGRAPHY? I don’t know, maybe photographs are more like that then my life. I owe for my photography to person I don’t want to owe.

YOUR WISHES FOR TOMORROW… At least one problem solved, mine or someone’s doesn’t matter. http://levankakabadze.com

$ E M I O T E X T

INTERVIEW CAN YOU DESCRIBE YOUR ARTISTIC BACKGROUND? Pretty classic stuff I guess. I’ve always been drawing and painting. As a kid I could sit for hours creating closed circuit-worlds with narratives visible only to me, myself and I. Later I went through the usual art-school period and came out bruised and semi-broken (also a pretty classic scenario as I understand it). One day I just decided to give it a try. It was either that or jumping out of a window... and that’s always an option anyway... so here we are.

LOOKS LIKE A LITTLE CRAZINESS… The Madness Stream. I don’t know about that one. Who knows these things, really? Some days I need to be reminded to brush my teeth and others I seem to function pretty well. The internal market is as infernal in its simplicity as any other market: you lose... you gain. As long as 5% of what you are trying to communicate reaches a functioning receiver the «system» works and suddenly you’re not mad at all.

YOUR PROJECTS? Yeah... me and my partner have just managed to get our first real studio so right now we are pretty busy setting up all sorts of projects and schemes. I’m working on illustrations for a 2012 project that hopefully will become a motion comic-animated film, released on DVD (before 2012 if «god» is willing and the involved are able). http://www.myspace.com/semidab

Depuis son lancement en 1998, Actuphoto a su s’imposer parmi les media culturels consacrés à l’actualité photographique ce qui lui a permis d’acquérir la confiance des plus grands organisateurs d’événements photographiques tels que l’agence VU, Magnum photo, la Maison Européenne de la Photographie, le Jeu de Paume, Paris Photo...

LES SERVICES Aux lecteurs • Les annonces des expositions dans toutes les villes où la photographie a joué et joue encore un rôle historique • Les actualités récentes du monde de la photographie • Une sélection d’ouvrages et de parutions • La couverture des principales manifestations, festivals, colloques, rencontres, salons ou signatures…

• Un accès gratuit aux alertes par email Aux photographes • L’annonce des concours, prix, bourses, appels à candidature • L’annuaire des professionnels de la photographie • Une rubrique CARTE BLANCHE mettant en avant des photographes originaux et marginaux à découvrir • Un espace membre permettant aux professionnels, amateurs et photographes d’échanger des informations et de soumettre leurs communiqués de presse ou événements

MINE DE RIEN

&

« TENTATIVES » Jean-Claude Delalande INTERVIEW of the illustrator Charlotte Quentin

J E A N C L A U D E

D E L A L A N D E

TENTATIVES ABOUT THIS SERIES I started thinking about this series over a year ago. During a counselling session, my analyst asked me whether I had ever thought about suicide. This question kept on going round in my head for a while. Then I asked myself how I would do it, if I were ever to do it at all? I thought about one of those throw away razors. I reckoned it wouldn’t be that successful, but rather funny. I then started imagining a character, at the end of his tether, who tries on a new way to commit suicide every day. None of his attempts actually work. Could it be that he’s not very good at it? Or maybe he’s just an attention seeker?

Whatever it is, a month and thirty attempts later, his family decides to lock him up in his kid’s playpen so that he can calm down and pull himself together. It is not that he’s been messy or that he’s upset anything in the family flat (he’s been taking every care not to annoy anyone too much), but the props he’s been using are now taking over the place.

NEWS AND PROJECTS At the moment I am in a group show in Paris (Mairie du 10eme) I’ll be presenting extracts from a few series at the Cultural Centre of the French Embassy in Belgrade, Serbia in early November. A few solo shows are getting ready in France, In the North and in Quimper, for a festival. I am also looking for a gallery to represent my work. And of course I always hope that my work will be noticed by an editor. I think that the dream of any photographer is to see their work in a book. http://jcdelalande.com

C H A R L O T T E Q U E N T I N

INTERVIEW ON THE CHOICE OF ILLUSTRATING: Well, I did not want to be a painter, nor did I want to be a graphic artist (and there is no need to add that I do not want to be an accountant, dentist or a realtor either...). Illustration just became the obvious choice for me. However at times, I tell myself at the end of the billing month that being a lawyer may not have been such a bad idea after all.

ON CHARLOTTE, A SACRED CHARACTER: I don’t know what you mean! Charlotte is a young woman who is mentally sound, stable, strong, independent, funny—yet often jaded towards the “others”... Nobody is perfect. When she breaks down and realizes she only has her cat to console her, she begins to listen to songs from the 80s on RFM while weeping, telling herself that it is time for a diet, and that she will never find the man of her dreams (pssst by the way, if you have heard of one let me know...). In short, Charlotte is after all like many other young women and she loves to make others smile by talking about her ridiculous mistakes.

OTHER PROJECTS? Well, I’d love to be published—but it really isn’t easy to do so. But I’m not going to give up just yet---never. I’m also doing a children’s book, which I have sent to the publishing house. I’ll keep you posted when I have a large stock to sell, okay? I can also paint a mural on your wall at your house, if you’d like... hem. www.myspace.com/leokadi www.myspace.com/laveritablecharlotteq

COLORS

&

Hélène Gauchou INTERVIEW of the artist Yumiko Kayukawa

H É L È N E G A U C H O U

INTERVIEW WHAT IS PHOTOGRAPHY FOR YOU? It’s hard to say. More than anything it is a way of looking at things, whether I have my camera with me or not. When I look at the world, I am not always thinking in terms of photography, but I do know that the way I see it would be different if there wasn’t any photography at all in my life. In the photographic act, what I really like is everything that happens before the click.

It’s a heart thing, a gut thing. There is no thought or conceptualization of “I”. In fact the “me” disappears, it’s quite relaxing. To me, photography is not a means, but a way. I have nothing to sell and nothing to say. All I try to do is to show what emotions trigger in me when I see them and if I am successful and others can feel them to, then I win.

WHY DO YOU CHOOSE TO USE THE PANORAMIC FORMAT? I use it, because of its dynamic potential, especially in street photography. For instance I like it when there are two subjects, one in the foreground and the other in the background and that I manage use this format to draw the attention of the spectator from one to the other. I don’t want to use it “straight on”, like in landscape shots, but rather to use it to emphasize perspective lines. I am still getting used to the format and the photos presented here are still first drafts, but I am working on it.

YOU FEEL LIKE GETTING ON THE ROAD AGAIN? On many roads, yes! I would like to link photography and a tour of North America’s deserted areas. Some of these ghost towns feel really surreal because there is nothing left there but empty buildings. I’d like to see them before they disappear too. Apart from that I’d like to go to Iceland and Argentina (amongst other places), but then again as I’ve been living in Vancouver for more than a year, it feels like I am travelling all the time already… www.flickr.com/people/helene_pom/

Y U M I K O K A Y U K A W A

INTERVIEW YOUR INSPIRATION? Inspiration comes from my feeling at any moment. Such as when I hope, enjoy, impressed, feel sad, mad or wondering.

I love music (rockn’roll) and movies a lot, I inspired of scenes from movies or lyrics from songs. I’m a big animal lover too.

Many ideas come up when I saw them in the nature or in a wild life TV show. Plus, since I moved from Japan to the U.S., I have different feeling that I didn’t have before. It’s very interesting to me to see my home country from the out side, and to see inside America I used to imagine from the outside. This new feeling gives me a lot of inspiration.

HOW DO YOU CREATE? First I draw a sketch with pencil on a paper, and then trace it on canvas or wood board. Paint with acrylic, and draw thin lines as hair or animal whiskers by a drawing pen.

YOUR PROJECTS? A solo show at Shooting gallery in San Francisco is coming up in November 14th, And some group shows in 2010 spring. www.sweetyumiko.com/ www.myspace.com/yumikokayukawa

EXTRAITS

&

« TE SOUVIENS-TU QUAND TU AVAIS LES CHEVEUX LONGS? » Jean-Christophe Sartoris INTERVIEW of the artist Gusclock

J E A N C H R I S T O P H E

S A R T O R I S

INTERVIEW HOW WAS THIS SERIES BORN? It all started in a family holiday home. The objects around me remind me of generations of people that succeeded one another within these walls. All these people; their lives, passions, torments and secrets. Only the furniture is now left, like silent witnesses. There is a feeling of nostalgic emptiness, one of my favourite themes in photography.

IMAGINARY OR DOCUMENTARY? I think it is an imaginary documentary. The objects belong to day to day life, they are real. Nonetheless, they carry an imaginary weight. Each one of us can link them to a particular story, a moment or emotion. Even if they are strangers to us, we can still make them part of our own life, with its moments of joy, pain or nostalgia.

WHAT ARE YOUR PROJECTS? I would like to go back to composing music again, which is what drove me to do photography in the first place, just enough for an album or a music-painting project. Nothing is set yet though. I’d like to use this as a way to refocus before future photographic project. www.jcsartoris.com

G U S C L O C K

INTERVIEW TALK TO US ABOUT YOUR WORK: In the beginning, my pictures were a mixture of photographs and drawings. After a while, after learning to use Photoshop better, I started to ass picture I didn’t have. I mean, it is quite difficult to travel to New York to take aerial picture of skyscrapers or to go on a ship and take picture of off shore oil platforms (and I won’t mention images of women dressed in 40’s fashion).

To create these images I downloaded royalty-free resources. Of course they are often useless because the resolution is so low, although they might be OK if I distribute my work only electronically. This means that I have been trying to take my own pictures. This way I can copy and paste my own objects, sceneries and people. And then I doodle on top of it all.

WHAT INSPIRES YOU? I haven’t mastered the graphic designer’s techniques and I don’t possess the inspiration of an artist, but I do need to express myself other than through words. For a long time I played bass guitar in a band with a few friends. I also used to take a few pictures and dabble in Photoshop in order to create an image for the band. Since then we’ve stopped playing together and the only way I have found to express myself is these collages. These images remained saved on my hard drive for a long time, then one day my friends started meddling and insisted on seeing them, in the end I let myself be convinced to show them regularly. It is not a thing I find easy to do. I am very influenced by artists such as Julien Pacaud, Stanley Donwood , Gildas Secretin… and I like to work while listening to bands like Ez3kiel, Radiohead, Massive Attack, Portishead, DJ Shadow, Bonobo, Ratatat, Sigur Ros, Archive, Wax Taylor, Gotan Project, Shaolin Soul… I could fill in pages. I am also very much influenced by the news.

ANY COMMISSIONED WORK? No, this is something I don’t know how to do or maybe I could so it if I was given a piece of music to work from instead of written or spoken constraints.

YOUR PROJECTS? I’d like to carry on learning and master the techniques of digital photomontage, maybe try to exhibit my work and reform the band. But nothing is set in stone. My main goal is to let my hair down a bit and express myself. http://www.myspace.com/gusclock

HIDE

&

« BESTIA PARVULUS » Pamela Klaffke INTERVIEW of the artist Lolita Picco

P A M E L A K L A F F K E

BESTIA PARVULUS BIOGRAPHY Pamela Klaffke is a Canadian writer and photographer who shoots exclusively with analogue cameras and expired and/ or damaged film. She is the author of the recent novel, Snapped, and the founder of the Secret Society of Analogue Art, an organization that encourages the creative fusion between analogue and digital communication by offering a series of ongoing participatory art projects.

HOW WAS THIS SERIES BORN? I’ve always been fascinated with the darkness of traditional children’s fairy tales, and had just finished reading a new translation of Hans Christian Andersen’s work when I bought the bunny mask in a local shop. The photos turned out so well I decided to track down more masks and shoot a series.

ARE THESE IMAGES MORE CREEPY THAN WONDERFUL? I like to think they’re both. I’m always intrigued by images that are dark and fantastical, but still have a sense of humour and I hope this series has achieved that balance.

ANY PROJECT? There are always projects. I’m shooting two new series and exploring ways to fuse my writing and photography work. I’m also curating a new participatory art project called Sara’s Nightmare ( www.sarasnightmare.com ) through the Secret Society of Analogue Art. www.pamelaklaffke.com

L O L I T A P I C C O

INTERVIEW WHAT ARE YOUR ARTISTIC TECHNIQUES? I mix traditional techniques (drawings, collages, stamps) along with the softwares Photoshop and Illustrator. I also use a lot of old photographs, old, antique papers from flea markets which I scan and rework on the computer. I always try to maintain a “handmade look” in my illustrations and artwork, as I do not appreciate a sanitary “computerized” look.

WHERE DO YOU FIND YOUR INSPIRATION? I find my inspiration in the work of illustrators that I really appreciate, in scenes from my daily life, and also from my past taken from my collection of old photographs (from the 1920s to the 80s...). But I am not only an artist of nostalgia, as many current political and social events inspire me. When I follow the news, there seem to be so many things that are beyond me and too absurd, that I feel the need to express it all at my own level. I am not 100% engaged, but let’s say that since I have the opportunity to express ideas through my designs, I take advantage of it. Also, it often gives a double layer of meaning to some of my work, because behind the colors and behind the pure aesthetics, there is always a “message” more or less negative about what I feel about current events (for example: the illustration “Made in China” or also “Obama” made just after the excitement of his election).

A WORK OF ART THAT HAS ADE AN IMPACT ON YOU? It’s difficult to choose just one work! I would say that I am moved by Egon Schiele’s work because just through his drawings, he betrays his emotions, his injuries, his neuroses--and despite myself, I love the tormented spirits. As for more contemporary styles, I am very interested in graffiti, and I also greatly appreciate works by Dran, Jaw and Bom.K. www.myspace.com/lo_litaa

CHILDHOOD

&

« XÏNZHÀI » Fabien Basmaison INTERVIEW of the artist Juan

F A B I E N B A S M A I S O N

XÏNZHÀI WHAT IS PHOTOGRAPHY FOR YOU? A mystery? Not long ago I was talking about my practice and said that taking a camera and shooting people is of course exposing them to my film, but it’s also exposing myself to others more than I normally would. When taking a photograph, you are not only appropriating part of people’s live, but you are also becoming a part of their lives yourself after the click. It is an exchange. I am far from being a great technician. I learn every day, through people I meet in the photography shop down the road from me, in the street. As an architect, a building always has something to teach us about its own time, about the people who used to live there, about what its future can be. Photography enables us to present this building to others, who can explain it and describe it. Yes, I think that photography allows me to apply a very simple concept of exchange.

TELL US ABOUT THIS SERIES. XÏnzhài,and I, it’s a love story. This small village set amid the Guangxi rice paddies, within the Miao community had never met a foreigner before. It was a huge privilege for me to live there even if, in the beginning, it was only a professional contract.The Guangxi is a Chinese province with a peculiar statute, as it is not governed by the Han community (which is the dominant ethnic in China), and contains many minorities. In the village, the only person speaking Mandarin Chinese (汉语 or Hànyǔ, which is the language of the Han community and de facto China’s official language) was the director and teacher at the school we were going to rebuild. These pictures document two visits, once in 2007 to check the site and to take note of the needs and wishes of the villagers and pupils; the second one in 2008 to see where we were at.

During our first visit, we learn that some pupils had to travels for hours in the snow, the mud and sometimes not actually going back home until the road is rebuilt after a landslide, as well as a whole list of daily experiences that are completely unknown to French pupils. This helps putting one’s problem into context; these children do have to fight in order to study.

Every time we went, the local dignitaries came and the children were gathered to meet us, the girls wearing their best white dresses. It was adorable and touching, completely different from what we do.

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR TOMORROW? Get a job? :) I’d love to get some money from the sales of these images so that I can buy and send school stuff to the kids over there or maybe simply to take part in the development of education in this village. I am sure that any help, however small, will be appreciated. Other than that I think I need to learn more about photographic techniques. I have never been a fan of photographs that appear too clean and artificial; they look like old digital images where everything used to be perfect and therefore unreal. So that means learning to take more authentic photographs, maybe a bit less technically perfect but still making sure that they are beautiful; not because the end result is clean and sharp, but because it makes people react in some way. Clearly I need to work more with film-based cameras. Oh, and I need to edit all these RAW files, but that can wait :) http://www.arkhi.org/

J U A N

INTERVIEW DESCRIBE YOUR UNIVERSE TO US. I find it difficult to describe my universe at the moment because it is changing, but I’d say it is quite dreamlike. I have a naïve, nearly anguished way to look at thing. I like to consider that a dream can be transformed into a nightmare, and inversely. At the moment, I am drawing on Kraft paper. It retains the true colour of paper. I like its rawness, which is in direct opposition with the toxicity of the media I use (biro, acrylics, felt tip pens). It kind of highlights the genetically mutated side of some characters and thus, somehow, what the world is like right now.

WHAT INSPIRES YOU? The symbolist period, the skate culture and American art (surrealist pop), artists such as Jim Phillips and Jeff Soto (check out Juxtapoz magazine and Feca Face), graffiti, tattoo art, old movies and old sci-fi cartoons.

ANY PROJECT? I am working on a group show at the Art de rien gallery in Paris in February and at the Green Gallery in Toulouse in March. www.creabook.com/juan www.myspace.com/juanelgatoloco

Digital Photo Professional, plus communément appelé «DPP», est le logiciel de traitement d’images édité par Canon et fourni gratuitement avec tous les reflex numériques de la marque. Spécialisé dans le développement des fichiers RAW «Canon», il permet aussi de travailler au post-traitement des images JPEG et TIFF via une interface simple et des outils judicieusement choisis, faciles à appréhender et à maîtriser. Ainsi, en plus d’être le seul logiciel capable de donner accès à toute l’information contenue dans les fichiers CR2 issus des boîtiers Canon, ce «dématriceur» qui a sa place parmi les meilleurs du marché est un formidable outil d’apprentissage du traitement des fichiers RAW pour les photographes qui travailleraient pour la première fois avec un logiciel de développement.

Cet e-book est le tout premier titre en langue française entièrement dédié à DPP. Après une présentation des principales fonctionnalités du logiciel et un rappel des notions essentielles à un traitement d’images maîtrisé (exposition, luminosité, histogramme…), il propose une découverte par la pratique des points forts du logiciel à travers une vingtaine d’exemples concrets détaillés pas à pas.

CITIZEN

&

« LA GRANDE VILLE» Alain Etchepare INTERVIEW of the Band « The Traps »

A L A I N E T C H E P A R E

LA GRANDE VILLE WHAT IS PHOTOGRAPHY? First of all, it is a fantastic way to express oneself. It enables me to communicate my vision of the world with others and, through it, I try to bring people into my universe. This is done via themes I want to share, or through capturing moments or places that touch me, according to my moods and my imagination. I have no other goal than to bring a bit of myself into it. Photography also allows me to live a fuller life, it forces me to focus and take a step back from myself and the world in general. Finally, photography allows people like me, dreamers and idealists, to live a bit outside reality.

AN AMBIANCE… It is that of a winter country, isolated, there the presence of man can only be felt through the silence and the wind and that is barely visible amongst an immense plain.

SO YOU HAVE ANY PROJECTS? I have too many. My next project will certainly be a universe influenced by Murakami, in which we wouldn’t know whether we are living in reality or outside it, in dream or folly. In any case I do not want to restrict myself to any photographic style. I’d rather find the one that fits each project.

SYNOPSIS What is the name of this town, before our eyes, whose walls bleed fear and regrets? A cannibal, octopus–like city that is blanketing the world. Is it the result of a society that went too far to finally pose control and suffocate? A city where terror reigned, where you wouldn’t want to stray from its wide and well-lit avenues? A city that was the reflection of a world led by consumerism, where greed and the thrill for novelty created boredom and discrimination. A place where everybody burnt the fallen idols we used to worship yesterday. A paradoxical city, overcrowded, that wanted to be perfect but led ultimately to loneliness. A city victorious. Of the billions of souls that peopled it there is only dust left… Barely the whisper of memory.

Through this series I have tried to invite you to visit this city, dead and silent. You’ll be the only visitor, the only person to wonder, alone and confronting your emotions and your regrets. How did we get to this point? Is man so blind?

In this series I searched our cities for these places we don’t see any more, these places that are sometimes quite recent but already forgotten, shrugged off, rejected. They are crushed by a never-ending modernism. These places seem out of time they are the symbols of a race against life itself. These ghettos whose inhabitants are ignored by the rest of the world, which is forever rushing blindly ahead, mesmerized by everything that shines, forgetting the essential. The city I am showing you is it a figment of my imagination? Isn’t it already here with us? Look! www.alainetchepare.com/

T H E T R A P S

INTERVIEW WHO ARE THE TRAPS? Jamie & Nick Berry, Dan Webb and James Minhas. All from Birmingham UK. HOW DID IT ALL START? We’d been friends and played music together for years until eventually it was time to form The Traps as we had a range of song ideas that we all wanted to work on.

WHAT KIND OF MUSIC O THE TRAPS DO? We play alternative indie punk with sun drenched melodies and harmonies. Bands like the beach boys, Television, Radiohead, the Pixies, Phoenix and the Clash were bands that influenced us a great deal. We also run a radio station under our Speech Fewapy name with monthly shows from UK, Montreal, New York and Edinburgh.

WHERE ARE THEY AT NOW… We have recently set up our own record label: Speech Fewapy Records: http://www.myspace.com/speechfewapyrecordings from which we have released two free Eps ‘Luna’ and ‘Elk’ so far in 2009. We are currently working on the next Traps release from the label. www.the-traps.com/luna & www.the-traps.com/elk The reason behind us setting about doing Speech Fewapy and our own releases was not only for the freedom and control of been able to record everything and release everything ourselves, but also because the whole creative project was completely ours. The music, the videos and the artwork were under our control. Also, 70’s punk label Stiff Records was a huge inspiration to us and gave us the drive to get on and start something ourselves. We have had ‘You Need Speech Fewapy’ t-shirts made which are very popular already, again taken as inspiration from the famous Stiff records T-shirt stating: ‘If It ain’t STIFF, it ain’t worth a fuck. …AND WHERE ARE THEY GOING? We aim to record and release as much as possible for our label and tour as far afield as we can. www.myspace.com/thetrapsofficial

Have participated to this issue: Laurence Guenoun - Publication Director / AD Carine Lautier - Editor In Chief Candice Nguyen - Communication & Advertising +33 689 921 043 Jorg Fischer - Graphic Designer / AD Mathieu Drouet - Webmaster Éric Battistelli - Journalist Christophe Dillinger - Translation Erin Kim - Translation Laurence Guenoun©- Photo Cover

Plateformag Copyright 2010 All rights reserved © All the pictures, photos published on Plateformag are property of their respective authors.