Written by Karolina Rybačiauskaitė. translated by Klaidas Stasiūnas
During the interview with Laura I realized, that I cannot continue on searching for stories behind her photographs – it simply wasn’t the way to do this. If I were to reveal all the answers to the questions Laura asks in her works, I’d steal the element of surprise off each of you. I became aware of this subtle lack of taste quite late; the true essence of her work – the macabre fairy tales hidden within her photos came alive to me, and I realized how the author feels them. Thus, it would be more appropriate for me to tell the tale of Laura’s world in such a way that it would leave you with nothing else but questions to which Laura’s photographs would be the answers.
Laura Makabresku is a 24 year old photographer from Poland. She’s currently residing in the city of Krakow, studying Polish literature. Laura describes herself in the following way:
I don’t have anything in common with myself. I’m a poet and an owl. I’m the sensitiveness and the empty space. Sometimes I feel that I grew up beside death.
Every human and animal, every skin crack and spot has its own place in her photos. And the pain those objects help to create is most often obscure, sometimes – barely noticeable. Why is it that those objects stare at us? It appears as if the border separating the observer and the photo, where the movement is captured, fades. Then again, there is no movement – it all seems lifeless, or perhaps, life is the only word that can describe what is pictured.
What is the exact nature of this life that Laura is trying to show us? What kinds of species are being portrayed, and why are they here?
In Laura’s photos life flows in and out through forests, humans, waters and earth. Inanimate objects in her photos are placed in the medium of the living – as if they are trying to be resurrected, reanimated. Typically objects are frozen in time, quiet and calm, suspiciously sensitive and suspiciously emotional. Women in her photos are trying to realize, understand, become aware of their being, they urge to feel alive, thus they touch themselves, try to inflict pain. It all hurts.
Every wound, tear is real. They are mine. And every photo separately I treat as my own spiritual child.
Laura Makabresku says that her main source of inspiration is fairytales; her nickname is a cumulative of hidden fairytale motifs, while her photos are a way of communicating with herself – a search for something she longs for. It seems to me that her photos are really open to their viewer. In an overly sensitive way, sometimes with the help of the words, they scratch at one’s longing, a very feminine longing for something that could be hidden in letters, nature, life and oneself.
If I could, I’d wear for you a scar after heart
Laura’s choice of fairytales is based on the duality of the subject – beautiful stories and grotesque imagery. On of the most important of such, she says are “The Brothers Grimm”.
Such double nature is an essence of not only what I create, but also of me as a woman.
Undoubtedly, inspiration also comes from love as the main source of the feeling of being alive and living. I did not question the kind of love she was talking about; I could only see the sad stories scattered in her photos.
What are the photographs telling me about? I ask myself without a slightest desire to find an answer – it all seems unreal, everything is lifeless, even humans are dead. Such a strong force comes through like an emotional shock, disintegrating every narrative, leaving only illustrations of what life once was. It’s only when I look at them, without thinking – I feel, just like Laura:
But when I put the vision into an image — for a second or two ir all starts to be quiet and calm. I breathe.
I think that’s a fairytale on its own.
More about Laura Makabresku here.
If you dear