About a month ago I wrote a piece about Czech photographer, Miroslav Tichy. I ended the piece by asking if anyone knew how I could find more of his work to contact me. Well, thanks to a reader (much thanks, Anne), I have found some more of his work, and it was, as I expected, well worth a further look.
My dilemma with his work is how he goes about taking these photographs. Are these women aware that they are being photographed? Admittedly, there is something exciting about an unexpected snapshot, but his photographs are so revealing, often catching subjects naked. Still, to his credit, the photographs are so cloudy and dreamy that they often don't even seem real, seeming instead to be some picture taken out of some memory or old fantasy. So, often the faces seem featureless or unrecognizable, protecting the subject from any possible embarassment.
This from Arndt & Partner Berlin:
"In self-imposed obscurity Miroslav Tichy has used his limited photographic equipment with immense virtuosity, producing an astounding body of work - unique in its originality and stupendous in its formal excellence - dedicated to a single theme: the appeal of the female figure."Tichy was born in 1925 in a small town in Moravia (Czech Republic) where he still lives today. Having studied at art school, in the 1950s he set out on a career in painting and drawing. However, totalitarianism and personal experience soon caused him to turn away from state-approved culture. Instead Tichy increasingly concentrated on photography. With great skill and imagination he even constructed much-needed items of photographic equipment from empty cans, spectacle lenses and wooden boxes."
I have had, in the past, a three picture rule when creating any new post, but I had to break the rule for Tichy.
Posted by Paul Hina at June 11, 2005 12:23 AM