THE TWO SWORD EDGES OF PHOTOGRAPHY: INTIMACY AND LOSS… WITH EUGEN K

One of the great things about photography, particularly portrait photography of the Elska style, is the intimacy created through the working relationship between photographer and subject. It is a necessarily personal relationship, required because a model needs to feel comfortable in order to be photographed and because a photographer needs to feel enough at ease to get close without feeling obtrusive. Awkwardness is absolutely perceptible to both the casual and trained eye, so rapport – even friendship – needs to be built.

Forming friendship is a great thing of course, but it’s one edge of a double-ended sword. For a project like Elska, where we shoot each issue in a different city, hundreds or even thousands of miles away from the previous one, friendships are doomed. My shoot with Eugen K for the Lviv, Ukraine issue is a great example of this duality.

I felt immediately comfortable with him, a soft-spoken artist who had the hospitality to have prepared tea and cakes for my arrival. After the shooting was done, which occurred slowly over the course of conversation, I wanted to linger. I wanted another cup of tea… but I had to get back for the next shoot. Eugen suggested a walk in town that evening, and I said that I would try to, even though I knew my schedule made it unlikely. I suggested meeting during a small gap in my schedule the next morning, but he had to work.

Of course I’m glad to have met him and spent time with him at all, and I should count myself lucky that I have a set of photographs that will aid my memory when old age starts to need a reminder. But it’s also a tragedy, because I may never see him again, and this sense of loss would never have afflicted me if I hadn’t met him in the first place.

Elska Boy: Eugen K

Photographer: Liam Campbell

Location: Lviv, Ukraine

Elska Magazine: Issue (01) Lviv

#LvivUkraine