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Talent Show: Piotr Karpinski
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Born in Poland, moved to Great Britain in 2006. Studied photography at Farnborough College of Technology and Middlesex University. In 2014, was featured in The Catlin Guide 2015|New Artists in the UK. Was selected for a number of group exhibitions including the exhibition organized by The Royal Photographic Society. First solo show “Let’s Talk about Life & Death Darling” was held in London in 2015. Piotr’s work has been selected for Creative Review The Photography Annual 2015. The winner of a Breakthrough Award 2016 by The British Journal of Photography.
I just want to be happy. That is the primary reason I decided to be a photographer. It is hard for me to imagine being happy and not doing photography at all. I was always thinking of becoming one. I was like eight when I got my first camera, a Polaroid. And I quickly realized that it’s insane, mental, and absolutely genius to be able to record what your eyes can see. It is like taking a sample of a reality around you and making a copy of it — I find it crazy cool. I guess I decided on it when I realized that it was time to prepare some photography portfolio which would allow me to get a place at a university years after. It was a slow and natural process. There was no lightning burning my home and leaving only me and my camera alive.
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The photo below is titled Katarimukha Mudra as Death. Mudra is a symbolic or ritual hand gesture in Hinduism and Buddhism. One of the meanings of the spiritual sign of Katarimukha mudra, known as scissors, is “Death.”
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What makes me different from others is the way I see stuff around me I guess. The individual perception of everything. I am a human with a mortal body like all of us. I am fascinated with Life and Death so I think of those much more than a regular person I believe. I am made of contrasts. I love contrasts in life, art and photography — visually and on a conceptual level. Introvert and extrovert in one with the entire package attached to those. I have a bipolar personality I would say — and it reflects in my work.
![PiotrKarpinski_11](https://birdinflight.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/PiotrKarpinski_11.jpg)
I feel like I am photographing ideas and concepts rather than people. I shoot pictures about Life, Death, and Time. Time is my biggest inspiration. Observing its consequences fascinates me — including Death and Life — those mixing together all the time and everywhere. What is always behind the image is a thought. Thoughts behind my photographs are my own concerns and fascinations, I use photography to record them. I depict my own states of mind when creating a picture often, even if it looks like a portrait of someone else. I am interested in memento mori as a theme in visual art and I think that it is a big part of my work as well. I like codes and metaphors — photography allows me to operate them using visual language. I am fascinated with “never”, “forever” and “always”. I photograph because it’s my way of expressing myself.
![PiotrKarpinski_06](https://birdinflight.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/PiotrKarpinski_06.jpg)
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