2024-05-17 23:53:16
Using coloration in documentary pictures was neither frequent nor advisable in Czechoslovakia within the eighties. At FAMU in Prague, some lecturers even warned college students towards him. It was at the moment that Vladimír Birgus started to work very inventively with coloration documentary pictures. Within the Behind the Shutter podcast, he talks not solely about this, but in addition about his work as a pictures historian and educator.
Vladimír Birgus, a local of Frýdek-Místek, shapes up to date Czech pictures to a big extent, even in a number of roles: in fact as a photographer, but in addition as a historian, educator and writer of many books. He celebrated his seventieth birthday, which fell on Could 5, with two massive exhibitions. The primary, entitled Black and White, offered his work from the 70s to the 90s. The second is known as Pink and Blue and may be seen on the Leica Gallery in Prague till June 9.
“It’s such a distinction to the primary exhibition. It solely consists of coloration images and, furthermore, focuses solely on purple and blue colours. It’s because the Leica Gallery will not be very massive, and along with the curator Martin Dostál, we determined that we’d fairly concentrate on two outstanding colours, fairly than exhibiting too many images there,” explains the photographer, who is likely one of the pioneers of Czech coloration documentary pictures.
Colours enchanted him already within the eighties
In fact, coloration pictures was already comparatively widespread at the moment, but it surely was primarily the area of nice artwork pictures and even nude pictures, explains Birgus. “At the moment, I used to be already educating at FAMU, and as a part of documentary pictures, Pavel Štecha immediately warned towards coloration pictures,” he provides.
Nevertheless, there was already a superb coloration documentary in America at the moment, and it was additionally on the rise in neighboring Germany, for instance. “At the moment, Jan Ságl, for instance, took coloration photographs right here,” Birgus factors out. In line with him, it was one of many photographers who knew learn how to use colours within the documentary in a extremely attention-grabbing approach.
What does a fantastic photographer want? Expertise and fervour
As a historian of pictures and as a instructor, Vladimír Birgus met many phenomenal photographers. In line with him, all of them have two issues in frequent: Expertise and nice ardour for the trigger. “Actually good documentarians go all out,” he says. Nevertheless, there are two varieties below it.
An instance of the primary may be Josef Koudelka, who devotes the whole lot to pictures and sacrifices his private life for it. “After which there’s a man like Jindřich Štreit, who will not be solely a fantastic photographer, but in addition helps individuals on the margins of society to attract consideration to their issues and, above all, is a superb instructor who devotes himself to college students from morning to nighttime and ignites younger individuals for documentary pictures. “
Vladimír Birgus within the podcast studio Aktuálně.cz. | Photograph: Tomáš Vocelka
First competitors at eleven, first solo exhibition at seventeen
Vladimír Birgus took half within the first pictures competitors as a schoolboy, he was eleven years outdated on the time. What was he photographing then? “It was undoubtedly some staged photographs,” he recollects. His nice position mannequin was Taras Kučynskyj.
The primary solo exhibition got here when he was seventeen. “These had been additionally staged photographs. There have been varied sequences, I additionally photographed, for instance, the small print of the act of a black man and a white girl. However at the moment I used to be already intensively concerned in documentary pictures, and my second exhibition (on the V Podloubí Gallery in Olomouc) was centered on ni,” provides Birgus.
Literature, theatre, movie and pictures
Though Vladimír Birgus is likely one of the most well-known Czech lecturers specializing in pictures, he himself initially began learning one thing else. “It was the Literature, Theater and Movie main on the College of Arts in Olomouc,” he says. In line with him, there was a way more relaxed environment on the college at the moment than, for instance, on the College of Arts in Prague. “Academics there weren’t afraid to speak about banned authors, they confirmed us banned movies,” he says.
Nevertheless, as a result of he was additionally attracted by pictures, he first attended the so-called Ján Šmok college. He finally utilized to FAMU and was accepted. “I did not need to hand over my already began research in Olomouc, so I studied each colleges on the identical time,” he says and considers it a bonus. “I am glad that at the moment, after I write about one thing from the historical past of pictures, I even have an summary of what was occurring in literature and in movie,” he explains.
Vladimír Birgus: Coney Island, 2019 | Photograph: Vladimír Birgus
He began educating photographers proper after graduating
“Instantly after I graduated from FAMU in 1978, professor Professor Šmok supplied me a educating place. To today, I’m grateful that I can educate most of my life,” says Birgus, who at the moment heads the Institute of Artistic Images on the College of Arts and Sciences College of Silesia in Opava.
The institute has gained a superb status, attracts international college students and lecturers, and its graduates apply themselves in follow and at varied pictures competitions. “I believe the composition of the educating workers is the primary factor that draws college students to our faculty,” explains Birgus.
“We do not have a studio system the place college students examine below one pedagogue for 5 – 6 years. They will select any of the twenty-one pedagogues for seminars or thesis supervision,” he provides. A number of Polish lecturers additionally work on the college (Jan Brykczyński, Arkadiusz Gola, Michał Szalast).
Vladimir Birgus: Málaga, 2024 | Photograph: Vladimír Birgus
Dozens of books and plenty of world exhibitions
Vladimír Birgus is the writer or co-author of an extended sequence of publications. When requested what number of books he has written, he shrugs. “I do not know precisely off the highest of my head, however there are undoubtedly over seventy of them,” he states. He typically collaborated with Jan Mlčoch or Pavel Scheufler when writing them. Most of them had been additionally printed in English, and lots of of them performed an necessary position in selling Czech pictures overseas.
Of the numerous massive exhibitions of well-known Czech photographers that Vladimír Birgus ready around the globe, he in all probability loved the one centered on the work of Josef Sudek essentially the most. It was proven within the Nationwide Gallery of Canada and in Paris. “We had the chance to work on it for 3 years and go to Sudek’s collections in several nations,” he says.
He had the chance to satisfy Sudek himself. “However it was extra like random conferences on the road and one time we had been sitting at a desk collectively in a pub,” he says.
Within the podcast behind the Conclusion, we can even discuss in regards to the Nude in Czech Images 1960-2000 exhibition, which he was the curator of and which had a particularly excessive attendance. “If I am not mistaken, 47,000 individuals got here to see it within the Prague Fortress, however that was nothing towards the truth that it was included within the pictures competition in Moscow. It passed off within the Manéž there along with the Annie Leibowitz exhibition,” says Birgus. 360,000 individuals got here there in two months and there have been lengthy queues. “However I am below no illusions, it was primarily due to Annie Liebowitz,” he factors out.