motives in
Sonia Szóstak photography
Sonia Szóstak, a Polish photographer, born in 1990, graduated in Photography on PWSFTviT in Łódź. She specializes in fields like portraits, acts, fashion, lifestyle and editorial photos. The turning point in her career was an exhibition in Milan with photos from Italian Vogue edition. Now, she is mostly popular because of her fashion and advertising campaign photos, but she does not neglect her own, non-commercial, photographic projects, which convey valuable messages for their recipients. Szóstak's acts and portraits always show young and beautiful people, in particular women. She follows the Greek canon of beauty – she portraits slender and tall women, with gentle make-up and fair skin. Neither the clothes nor accessories or jewellery play a vital role in her creations. What is most important is the confident look in the women eyes. The artist not only preserves the beauty of a young body, which will inevitably pass, but also the strength and charm of these people, which, I believe, will last forever. Another distinctive feature of Szóstak's photos is intimacy. The people in her pieces of art are very natural and uninhibited, because the borders between the model and the photographer were not crossed. As Szóstak claims in an interview for i-D magazine, building a relationship with her model is of utmost importance. Many of her models are her friends. She cannot work with anybody, although there are a lot of beautiful models around. Szóstak chooses people with an interesting personality and character. She maintains that there is a different energy and message in photos, when women are on the both sides of the lens.
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Paintinglike The link between Sonia Szóstak's photos and classical oil paintings of old masters is very strong and it is not only the light, color scheme and saturation. The photographer almost imitates paintings through the use of composition and context. In the picture placed below, we can see a naked woman in a bourgeois interior – an image similar to many paintings (the Venus of Urbino painting by Titian not to seek far). However, the woman from Szóstak's work plays a more distinct role than her predecessors from old paintings. She makes a gesture of covering herself, but she is not like Venus pudica – she is a contradiction of shame and humility. In my opinion, Szóstak wants to show us the same contexts, in which women were presented for years, but with a different bias. Femininity in her photos is a synonymy to strength and self-confidence, without a shadow of tameness. Women are released from the covenants. It shows clearly the spirit of her generation, which she continually pursues in her photos.
Sonia Szóstak also made a series of photos inside, where an effective use of light and shadow plays a huge role and creates a specific mood. These pictures (one exaple on the next page) greatly remind me of Edward Hooper paintings. Human figures are suited to these interiors through their position, colors and vibrations. The composition seems to be exactly calculated. Szóstak shows the beauty and uniqueness of our ordinary surroundings.
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There are many more references to paintings in Sonia Szรณstak photographs, for example she made plentiful portraits, which imitate the topic of women with fruit presented in paintings almost from the beginning of art. Like in paintings, the photographer creates an image of women, honed to perfection. But, as we know the rules or conventions which govern portrait paintings, we can accept it and interpret these photos as present-day portraits of the youth generation.
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Adam and Eve in paradise Another topic in Sonia Szóstak works is a human in wild nature. On photographs we can see naked people, acting and looking like early men. They are living normal lives in theirs nudity and lack of conventions. We lose the Garden of Eden, but we do not have to surrender and abandon our freedom, although there is a longing for the paradise in Szóstak's artworks. Those people enjoy the life without any borders. Like in her previous photos, the spirit of the generation is explicitly presented.
Black and white Black and white photographs play an important part in Szóstak's works. Following Henri Cartier-Bresson ideas, color is dedicated to paintings, while black and white are the domain of photographs. Unlike the previous works of Szóstak, we can no longer find references to painting, but rather to movies. It is said, that the photographs by Peter Lindbergh (by whom Szóstak is inspired) redefine the standards of beauty with their timeless images. I believe that the message and lack of color are essential for photos to become timeless. Szóstak does the same thing as Lindbergh, but she is restricting the frame to favour youth and beauty once again. However, unlike Szóstak, Lindbergh portrays women of every age. He wants to release women from the terror of youth and perfection (Interview magazine). Szóstak instead focuses on transitory prettiness, which only youth carry with itself. So, what is the message of her photos, except to dictate a definite canon of beauty? I think that the author wants to portray brave and confident women, with innocence and power flowing from their youth. In addition, she wants to show the dynamic of present days.
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In conclusion, Sonia Szรณstak puts her models in various contexts. Whether it is a history of art, wild nature without a shadow of culture or classical poses taken from photography and movies, she always presents people in a similar way. They are released from conventions, particularly from the shame of nudity. She is able to show intimacy and directness of her models, but in such a way that the recipients do not feel embarrassment or voyeurism. Youth is inseparably connected to beauty, innocence and wilderness. She shows femininity, from which spreads the power and self-confidence. Her models are like uninhibited original humans, even if they are settled in cultural context. The Aesthetic of Szรณstak's photos perfectly matches present trends (because of that she is probably so popular in advertisement photos), but is at the same time atemporal due to her following iconic motives.
Sources Susan Sontag On Photography, Cracow 2009 www.i-d.vice.com www.interviewmagazine.com www.soniaszostak.com
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