Václav Kopecký
Autorův zájem o médium analogové fotografie, jejíž „anachronické“ využití v době digitálních technologií se stalo výlučností, odkazuje k obecné tendenci techno-nostalgie, kterou můžeme přiřadit k širšímu rámci sebereflexivivních strategií současného umění. Je ovšem zjednodušující zhodnotit Kopeckého přístup k analogové fotografii jako fascinaci překonaným médiem. Nejedná se totiž o rozvzpomínání nových médií a technologií na vlastní historii, tedy o určování a prezentaci vlastní identity na základě kulturní paměti. Václav Kopecký pracuje s analogovou fotografií jako s „živým médiem“, jehož možnosti jej baví systematicky prozkoumávat. Logickým projevem tohoto přístupu je také práce v temné komoře, respektive autorské zpracování všech technologický procesů výroby fotografie. Stejně logickým projevem je zájem o sémantickou rovinu tohoto média.
Marika Kupková
- When you developed a film badly before the existence of photoshop,00:00:08.056
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- you had to restore it, go one step backward.00:00:19.249
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- There are different types of developers00:00:24.549
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- and a corrective whitening bath. That's really good.00:00:31.503
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- This is the last photolab I know and I'm sure there's nothing of this sort...00:00:50.438
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- Mr FotoOto would develop photos directly from negatives here and00:01:00.971
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- he avoided digital processing. He finished this year's summer.00:01:07.798
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- I got here by accident, they asked me if I wanted to take the shop over.00:01:16.546
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- I came here to realize the principle of such shop type.00:01:22.614
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- I wanted to prove myself it wasn't possible to run it this way.00:01:30.043
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- Analogue photo is principal because of the material.00:01:44.309
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- Recently I've been thinking why I do it this way,00:01:48.993
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- especially in the context of the technology which00:01:52.474
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- is dying out slowly or at least the range00:01:55.845
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- available on the market is decreasing...00:02:00.103
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- I am quite reliant on companies producing the chemicals and paper.00:02:03.060
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- I wondered whether I would get along00:02:09.725
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- with digital version and work with digital photos.00:02:12.092
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- I came to the conclusion it would all break down.00:02:19.006
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- I wouldn't be able to do without a darkroom.00:02:25.088
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- Or without the material itself.00:02:30.606
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- I can't replace this stage with a computer programme00:02:32.808
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- and a device that would print it...00:02:39.430
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- I can't imagine adding the aura which is a result of me being a part of the process...00:02:46.890
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- The clock works... It just looks it doesn't...00:03:05.602
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- The sweep-second hand is important.00:03:09.337
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- And when you start working in the dark,00:03:11.764
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- the time works in a different way...00:03:14.930
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- Even if the clock kept good time, it would only make you stressed,00:03:20.061
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- but it couldn't be helped...00:03:25.929
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- A photographer looks into the objective,00:03:34.219
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- he picks a composition, squeezes the release and00:03:36.615
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- creates a picture he can later materialize by developing00:03:39.866
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- on a photographic paper. His priority is the picture.00:03:47.375
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- Whereas my priority is developing the photo.00:03:51.980
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- When I look into the viewfinder, I do not compose because00:03:56.911
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- I compose during the stage of working with the material.00:04:06.037
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- In essence, I take the photographic paper and expose it somehow.00:04:13.221
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- I really enjoy my work. When I process somebody's order,00:04:25.752
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- the photo doesn't emerge until I expose it.00:04:32.568
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- Even when somebody wants me to blow up his photos from negatives00:04:40.489
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- I appropriate the photos for the moment before I return them.00:04:44.446
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- I consider them my own. And I don't even mind when00:04:49.732
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- someone brings me a negative I didn't shoot.00:04:53.765
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- What pictures do you have here at the moment?00:04:56.609
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- I can't show you.00:04:59.880
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- Why?00:05:02.456
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- Because not everything can be appropriated.00:05:08.519
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- When I'm blowing up photos, I often think about my work,00:05:17.535
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- it's much closer to free work.00:05:21.038
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- If I worked with clay, there are two ways of the process.00:05:41.796
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- I could model something with the help of a mould or by hand.00:05:48.644
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- When I work by hand I try to create something from material00:05:54.497
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- so that it makes sense and emerges without any outer context.00:06:02.482
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- I aimed for that in the coloured flags.00:06:09.792
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- In principle it's just a bent paper lit by00:06:15.062
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- a coloured light, it's a coloured paper...00:06:18.656
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- Important is that it isn't any ordinary object00:06:48.096
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- that would be just an object, there is also the photographic aspect,00:06:51.844
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- the gradation of disappearing light00:06:56.682
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- as it's lit just partly and not from the side.00:07:02.682
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- One part is in a negative shadow,00:07:08.799
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- so it was created just by the paper and shape.00:07:12.827
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- I called my recent exhibition act "The Backward Wave",00:07:30.039
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- it's an extensive series of river waves under a weir.00:07:36.244
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- Its formal appearance should remind of a wave,00:07:54.143
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- the end of the paper twists back and it should all signify work00:08:01.589
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- looking back but at the same time rolling up and going on.00:08:08.300
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- It doesn't stop or go back, there is this motion.00:08:16.257
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- It's interesting to observe a backward wave under a weir for example,00:08:22.364
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- similarly like looking into fire, it never stops, it keeps flowing and moving.00:08:35.268
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- And its present, its "now" keeps changing and shifting all the time00:08:40.590
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- and the only possibility how to follow up are sketches.00:08:45.193
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- I guess the sketches should chronologically precede the work.00:08:49.771
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- However I find more interesting to work on the sketches00:08:59.294
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- already with the topic awareness and experience.00:09:02.603