Sosi Vartanesyan

Sosi Vartanesyan works exclusively in black and white. All her works are hand printed on fiber based paper and processed archivally. Her latest series, “Après l'Ombre", are photograms, an old photographic process which existed since the very beginnings of photography. Her work represents a yearning and return to the source: a dismissal of contemporary and digital photographic techniques of image creation and printing.

“Since I love darkroom work and silver printing, which I consider an inseparable part of my photographic creation, I have been going back to “alternative" or primitive processes with the nostalgia of finding the soul of photos of the past. The title of this exhibition “Après l'Ombre" refers to the “shadows" that contemporary photographic techniques have cast on the soul of silver print photography, and the way I have been trying to find the light and my way out of the universe of pixels.

In addition to photograms, my journey includes the use of photographic emulsion that is applied with a brush to various types of surfaces such as art paper and fabrics, instead of traditional fiber based photo paper. This technique renders a special image close to a lithograph or ink painting which is unique since no two can be exactly the same. I have also experimented with a handmade “camera obscura" in my negation of our fast moving society overflowing with zillions of images every day. My work is about taking one's time and premeditation."