PROMISE OF MEETING

ANTONIS GIAKOUMAKIS

// Antonis does not believe in photographic discriminations… in categorisations. For him, the power of a photograph is to embody all the “categories”. Born in Chania, Crete, he likes to create stories with his camera. He shared with us one poetic story about parallel dances of a woman and a horse.

Although his profession was in information technology, Antonis has been seriously involved in photography for close to 10 years and has participated in exhibitions and competitions with several distinctions. He is an active member of the Greek photography group “Photopia”. “Photography is for me all that I do not want to forget in the moment I see it, in the place where I am, I move, I listen and I observe. It may not be objective, but it can be a constant reminder that the world is not what we see. It is creation, communication, storytelling. In other words, it is the undefinable and unclear that leads us to a personal approach to what we see, read or hear and try to analyze it without always succeeding!” The words of Ansel Adams, “You don’t make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved.” resonate with Antonis. His photography is not conceptual, he does not set out with a specific goal; rather he is interested in creating an atmosphere that may spark viewers to create their own narratives. To take us on trips that we did not expect to go.

“I express my feeling at a given moment. Not what I see but what I feel!”

André Kertész

What draws you to art?

“From the photography point of view, I would like to say that it is an inner need to express our feelings and relive images that often pass cinematically through our eyes or that are presented to us by chance suddenly. Using a superlative tone… to trap the time and to pass into immortality. So, expressing my emotions, I would like to believe that I will be able to make others feel what it is I’m feeling when I’m photographing. I think that life itself in all its manifestations, from human and the whole environment, by a street scene or from an image where human presence is implied, gives me inspiration. Photography and every form of art cannot be objective, but it can be a constant reminder that the world is not what we see. It is creation, communication, a narrative.”

What impressed you most about the experience of photographing the human dancer and the horse “dancing”?

“The identification in the harmony of movements, in the expression of the faces, in the agony and the fatigue from the effort, of a woman and a horse. At different times! High emotions contained, I think, in my accompanying text!”

In Atonis own words:

PROMISE OF MEETING

In an old factory I see a female figure dancing in an endless silence, the only sound that could be heard was the rustle of her clothes. I watch and photograph. Time passes, and I am in an equestrian club, a horse is dancing on the soft ground doing his workout. Only the sound of his heavy breathing could be heard. I photograph, trying to «cage» his movement.

And yes, the curtain opens. The woman like a fairy and the Pegasus.
In an expressive dance.
Two fleeting figures in parallel routes.
Lonely presences which are inclining to meet.
Freedom… in a confined space.
They raise their heads, looking for the unexpected. They bend down to see where they are stepping, they prepare the jump…
A woman and a horse, in a perpetual motion, in different directions, on roads that will not intersect.
They say that horses are “mirrors of our emotions”, they have carried our burdens, ourselves.

Parallel roads, parallel search. “Bow” and the curtain closes…

Because these are paired images, we have departed from our usual layout. Click on the photos to see a larger version.