Tales of Trees. Lecture by Daniel Filipek

What do landscapes hide? What tales can be told by the wind blowing in the trees or by the snow on mountaintops? What did Simon Schama mean when he wrote that “landscapes are culture before they are nature”?   During the meeting we will approach the landscape as a medium. We will analyse the connections between photography and landscape from the angle of the language of the contemporary photographic practice in order to see how this metaphoric character can be used to weave complex, multilevel narratives, how to “read” the landscape and why it is one of the most important carriers of memory and ideas. We will talk about Boring Photography and the identity of the place. Finally, we will examine the relations between power and ideology, and landscapes that have lost their innocence.     Daniel Filipek is a visual artist, journalist and an independent curator. He graduated in Cultural Studies from the University of Wrocław, and in Photography from the Creative Arts Centre in Wrocław. He runs an initiative called Overexpositions, which is a series of monthly meetings devoted to the most interesting phenomena in young Polish photography.     More information about the Hubert Hubka's exhibition Death Landscapes >>>

photograph by Paweł Starzec, "Heliodrom, Rodoc", from the series "Makeshift"