Marcin Sudziński "Black Light"

Black Light is a photography series created on the basis of diverse objects found after the death of my friend in his house. The objects were either his personal belongings (shoes, socks, scarves, tie, etc.) or possessions he kept for several reasons (including sentimental ones). What to do with objects that were witness to human presence with all its heavy baggage of emotions and intimacy? One of the ways may be to use them as artistic fabric, to alter their meaning and appearance, to invest them with a new logic. This thought is also dear to me in the context of my imagining life after death. An alternative to ultimate decay and utter annihilation would come in the surprisingly different shape, form, and dimension. To do so, I decided to use the most direct photography method which simultaneously bears witness to the presence of an object on photographic paper. Not a print developed from a negative, but a physical object that was placed on the paper, touched it, and created its own white "shade". Any light traces are reversed here, they are not of this world, as in this method light manifests as black, while its absence as white trace. To develop these images, I used lithographic developer and vintage "Fotonbrom" paper dating back to 1986, the combination of which slowly created quirky patterns and unexpected shapes. Each exposure was unique and as a result each image cannot be replicated and exists only as a single copy. Clearly past its sell-by-date, the paper worked fancifully beyond my control, which reminded me of pouring molten wax onto water and telling fortunes based on the shapes of the solidified wax.