KRISTINA MAKEEVA | SIMPLE MAGICAL THINGS
Finalist at the International Open Call Competition. A collaboration of Florence Biennale, Art Market Magazine, and Lens Magazine.
Often the term “magic” is applied to my photos. And there is.
I create my own magical world! As a person who grew up in the usual gray and ugly city near Moscow, I always tried to get into a fairy tale. In those fairy tales that I read in my childhood. My work features hobbits, Moomin trolls, Alice in Wonderland, The Silmarillion, fairy tales by Russian authors like Max Fry and others in the fantasy genre, etc.
With age, the perception of fairy tales and the tales themselves changed. With travels to my fairy tales, the national flavor of those countries I visit or read about has been added.
For example, in a project with flowing fabrics, I most recently spotted an Asian flavor. There are girls with fabrics flying in the wind in many Chinese or Japanese fairy tales. The simplest example is probably the Japanese anime of our childhood – Sailor Moon. Tales of Miyazaki.
Everything has an impact on us, and this is logical.
What do I want to show? I want to show the magic in the ordinary. We have a permeated project, probably, by all the photos called “Simple Magic Things.”
With this project, we want to show that everyone is surrounded by the amount of magic they can see. In the dank gray reality, there are little things that make our world magical; this magical reality is not somewhere over the mountain in the gardens of Sakura (which are overflowing in the spring, by the way). On the contrary, it is here, in our apple orchards, or in a cup of herbal tea in the rays of the setting sun. Any piece of fabric can turn into a magic train, and nothing impossible in principle.
Photography has tremendous power. It moves me and touches my soul. Sometimes I receive letters in private messages that my photo has helped to cope with sadness. Sometimes they mention depression and that it becomes even better for a moment – and I am glad. In fact, we initially began to work to carry the light of beauty into the world, however pathetic it may sound. And I see through the responses that light sometimes helps. In fact, this is what I want to bring with my photos, light, and wonder.
I started to photograph at the age of sixteen, I took the camera in my hands, and since then, I have been shooting. I did not study photography at the university, but there were related subjects, such as graphic design, web design, Adobe programs, etc. During my studies, I found myself creating presentations and Photoshop manipulation for physics courses, for example. The attraction was always there.
I’m working with Adobe programs since I was fourteen years old. My first camera was a Panasonic video camera, which took pictures with 640×480 pixels resolution in JPG format.
So I got a related education at the university, I studied graphic design, and the design point of view strongly influenced my work. Designers always create their worlds out of nothing.
As I am now – I always need to embellish reality.
Travel began much later, about five years ago, for work and vocation. Traveling opens up a new world for us, expands our consciousness, inspires, and makes us more tolerant. Therefore, all this greatly influenced my work.
In our projects, one of the main things is that all together create a feeling of unreal reality. As if we are now on a familiar planet, but as if from the inside. We look at it with different eyes or different points of view. What will play a leading role is not essential.
Sometimes the main thing is a glass ball.
Sometimes I shoot one shot without processing. Sometimes I collect the universe in pieces. But I always ensure myself with backgrounds, this is another secret – something that does not fit into an ordinary lens – will work in the post-processing. These are my personal stock photos. It is also essential to understand that I have accumulated a considerable amount of objects, airplanes, flowers, fabrics, snow, clouds, sunsets, balls, drops, etc. All that can be used for Photoshop manipulation. I collect my universes.
Moreover, often there are many people at any natural area or city sights at the right time, it has to be retouched. If it’s a very cold/hot spot, we shoot as quickly as possible and remove all the shortcomings in post-production. And sometimes it happens that we shoot the model before the trip or after it as if she one of the necessary details.
We want the viewer to believe. It is a deception, but it’s for creating a new reality. As you believe in movies or fairy tales in childhood.
But in any case, the photo has initially been a hoax. When we remove a beautiful temple, we frame it, and behind us, we see rubbish or a road with dusty mopeds. There was even some kind of photo project where the photographer was shooting, standing with his back to world sights. This is certainly interesting, especially when you do not leave the house, but we often already know what is behind us. By the way, it is gorgeous in Moscow if you stand with your back to St. Basil.
With photography, I developed my imagination as if I have a movie in my head. So when I plan to take something off, I plan more than what is physically possible. On a journey, it is rarely possible to do anything that I thought of at home in advance, but nevertheless, “homework” is necessary to create something unique on the spot.
So I’m more immersed in history, landscape, picture. Nevertheless, in outdoor shooting, everything depends heavily on nature.
As I’m preparing to travel to a new place, I first look at Google (Images and maps), and I use my own knowledge and experience to prepare props. But in fact, no matter how I planned, the result will be different. Therefore, I am preparing but not planning.
