I was always fascinated by convoluted organic worlds of Max Ernst’s paintings, full of elusive creatures emerging from indistinctive plant and animal matter that, being neither animals nor plants disappear back into the dark caverns and crevices of rotting convoluted foliage that surrounds them.
This collection was inspired by Ernst's works from the second world war period influenced
by unimaginable suffering and monstrosities happening all over Europe at that time. I drew my inspiration mostly from paintings entitled Napoleon in the wilderness, Solitary and conjugal trees and The temptation of St. Anthony.
I focused on one aspect of his work that stands out to me the most - the lack of depth
that squashes the painting into one almost flat world of overlapping vaguely defined entities
and shapes that inhabit it. In my photos it’s the murky waters of Dutch water canals that both hide the real shape of floating objects and pull them onto one plane where they cannot but interact with one another.
Yet there are no monsters here as opposed to Max Ernst’s nature that frightens, nature that creeps up from dark caves and crevices, nature that is ready to kill when least expected. In my decaying world the entities are mere involuntary emigrants from their natural habitats, travellers that got stuck in these bizarre worlds forced to live alongside each other.
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