It all started from Panevėžys. To commemorate the 520th anniversary of his birthday, photographer Juozas Petkevičius created a series of photographs that reflect the spirit of people who live
in a changing and reviving city. As the author himself mentioned: "I expected to find wonderful people in the city and photograph them. I also think that the photographs will inspire other people from Panevezys to create."
The honest work was done. And everything is told more by the works created by the author.
Photographs created using the wet collodion process seem to freeze time and immortalize the image. This is no longer just a household documentation or story - it is also about the person posing and the photographer's patience and certainty. The process of immortalization, which is characterized by precision and shortness of preparation happens a little differently than we who live in a computerized world where everything is recorded, photographed, uploaded, changed,
and deleted every second. The essence of a person's being, his true existence, is not revealed first moments while he poses, and while waiting, after a certain time, all the masks begin to fall, poses, the smile no longer lingers in the corners of the lips, the eyes no longer radiate pretend of joy - a person becomes what he really is. The author managed to capture in photographs such people as they probably never see themselves, to learn about them what they, apparently will never know. About what lies deep inside them, really...
The choice of such an immortalization technique is special because the result is often unpredictable,
unique and depending on chemical mixtures, interaction with air, oxygen, the poser's ability to stay in one place for a long time, and, of course, the skill of the photographer.
The unexpectedness that emerges in the flow of the details and the play of light in these photographs, the unhurried process, in which seriousness and concentration are maintained - the realities around us become brisk and hurried, the opposite and proposed alternative is to be able to stop, see and analyze yourself and the world beyond the everyday furrow and anxiety.
To photograph people and produce photographs by wet collodion means to feel another person
mortality, vulnerability, variability.
To paraphrase Susan Sontag, photography is the elegiac art of twilight, which in this particular case
testify to the relentless flow of time.
The sponsors of the project are Panevėžys City Municipality and UAB Amalkera.
Information partner JP.lt.