No 27

4 92
petra vlčková Freya Najade
Listening Trees If you are lucky,
you get old

20 102
Kimberly Witham
Domestic Arrangements Dominica Paige
Lull & Splendor

Elliot Erwitt
34 120
Michael Corridore
Angry Black Snake Ahndraya Parlato
Towards and

“To me, photography is 58

Uncertain Sight

140
an art of observation. It’s Deborah Paauwe
The Painted Mirror Bertil

about finding something Nilsson Naturally

interesting in an ordinary 72 162

Marcela Paniak
place... I’ve found it Genevieve Dominic Davies
Mapping London

has little to do with

the things you see and
everything to do with the
way you see them.”
Petra
Vlčková
Listening Trees

www.petravlckova.sk
6 7
8
I was trying to show human 11
interventions on the natural
landscape through my
photographs. The impact
of human presence is often
conscious and has a negative
affect on the environment which
can also be positive. There are
times when these interventions
go unnoticed, however they
posses a particular visual value.
My series of photographs is a
long term observation of these
situations. To articulate these
situations I have documented
my staged interventions within
this environment.
12 12
15
Petra Vlčková was born in 1991 17
in Slovakia. She received her
first camera when she was
13 years old and afterwards
decided to study at photography
department at Josef Vydra
School of Applied Arts in
Bratislava, Slovakia. After
her high school studies she
continued studying photography
at Tomas Bata University in Zlín,
Czech republic. She spent last
school semester in France in an
exchange program at School of
Art and Design in Orléans. She
has exhibited her photographs
in France, Poland, Czech republic
and Slovakia.
Kimberly
Witham
Domestic
Arrangements

www.kimberlywitham.com
22 My work is strongly influenced I arrange these items into
by natural history dioramas, ephemeral constructions that
cabinets of curiosity, still are simultaneously whimsical
life painting and other and grotesque. While these
manifestations of man’s images are inspired conceptually
attempt to categorize, by the Vanitas tradition,
comprehend and ultimately formally they are more akin to
control the natural world. contemporary home and style
magazines. In the pages of
The photographs in this series
these magazines, products are
pay homage to traditional still
arranged in clinical perfection.
life painting while underscoring
They promise relaxation,
the inherent tension between
fulfillment and simplicity if
humans and nature. While
we only buy one more thing.
Vanitas paintings refer to the
In contrast, my arrangements
futility of earthly pleasure,
highlight both the promise
the photographs in this series
of suburban comfort and the
question the consequences of
aftermath of our continued
our domestic comforts. Unlike
consumption.
traditional still lifes, which
often combined domestic
objects with items from foreign
locales, all of the items in
my photographs are found
close to home. The objects in
these photos include personal
possessions, flowers and
vegetables from my garden,
and birds and animals found
by the roadside.
 29

28
30 Kimberly Witham was born and
raised in Wakefield, Rhode
Island. She studied Art History
at Duke University and received
an MFA in photography from the
University of Massachusetts -
Dartmouth. Her photographs
are strongly influenced by her
background in Art History and
her interest in the natural world.
Her work has been exhibited
nationally and internationally
and featured in publications in
the USA and abroad. Kimberly
is an Associate Professor of
photography at Bucks County
Community College in Newtown,
PA. She currently lives and
works in High Bridge, NJ.
 33

32
Michael
Corridore
Angry Black Snake

www.michaelcorridore.net
37
38
40 41
This is a project that I have
undertaken over the past six
years or so. I’ve always had an
interest in the culture of the
automobile and its influence
on us.
My original thought was
to portray the people who
attended the events that
involved automobiles until I
experienced these incredible
moments during a burnout
competition. At the first
event that I attended, the
atmosphere in the crowds was
quite charged leading up to
the burnout competition. Once
the competitors began their
performances in the burnout
competition, these amazing
moments of absolute mayhem
unfolded within the crowds.
People, particularly kids, just
scattered in reaction to the
alarming jet engine noise levels
and the toxic smell of tyre
smoke. The smoke becomes
overwhelming, after a while,
your eyes sting and your lungs
are screaming for a break from
the rubber residue in the air.
The combination of smoke
and noise leads to these
strange dreamlike moments
where without the benefit of
information of the scenario,
it’s difficult to make senses
of the events. The actions of
the people in the photographs
seem totally at odds with what
appears to be going on within
their landscape.
The expressions on their faces
in many cases appear calm and
contradict the suggestion of a
tragic event unfolding.
It’s this loss of connection
with their environment, which
appealed to me. The smoke
created a visual censorship of
the true story. The movements
and reactions of the spectators
combined with the smoke and
random topography of the
landscape where these events
occur, helped to create this
strange sense of deceptive
perspective and back story.
You begin to question what is
happening in these people’s
lives within these sets of
circumstances.
These photographs have taken
on more of an observational
view of the way we interact with
our environment or landscape,
rather than be a commentary of
the given events. This train of
thought is more in line with my
landscape work, which relates
to a broader topic of the way we
in which we interact or impose
our ways on the landscape. The
photographs do pose questions
rather than offer an easy
answer. Like the landscapes
photographs that I take, the
work is minimal in its supply of
visual information.
The events themselves can 43
be rather spectacular and the
captured moments are fleeting,
which is why it has taken so long
to build a body of consistent
photographs. I’d be lucky to
leave an event with more than
a handful of images that I’m
happy with. If there is any
wind around, the smoke blows
through quickly, so you may
only have seconds to capture
the spectators suspended in
a curiously choreographed
moment. There are so many
variables, the people’s
positions, level of smoke,
direction of wind, weather
conditions, the nuances of
people’s reactions. The people
need only open their mouths
slightly, close their eyes or
turn their heads down and the
pictures will communicate a
different story.
When I first reviewed my proof
sheets from the very first event, I
found that the photographs that
were mostly filled with smoke
were the most compelling to
me. The scarcity of any visual
clues to the cause and effect
of the smoke, the censorship
of the landscape and the
apparent disconnection of the
crowds emotional response
to their environment asked
many questions. As the work
progressed, I found that I
needed to concentrate on
specific sets of circumstances
to capture the scenarios that I
wanted at these events. If those
circumstances didn’t evolve, I
wasn’t going to get the pictures
I wanted. The images are not set
up, subsequently this approach
dictated the time frame with
which I had to work with.
45
46
48
Born Melbourne, lives 51
and works in Sydney,
Australia. 
Graduated with a
Diploma in Photography at the
Photography Studies College,
Melbourne, Australia. Between
2003 and 2009 I divided my
time between Sydney and New
York, pursuing personal photo
media-based projects and
commissioned works.
‘Angry Black Snake’ received
the Aperture Foundation’s
Portfolio prize in 2009,
screened at the New York
Photo Festival and received a
honourable mention in the Fine
Art Series at the New York Photo
awards in 2008.
In 2008 ‘Roadworks’ landscape
series was runner up in the
book-publishing prize (Photo.
Book.Now).
52

52
54
56

57
Deborah
Paauwe
The Painted Mirror

www.deborahpaauwe.com
60 61
The desire to perform and
the want to conceal would
seem counterintuitive in
theory. The mere thought of
subjecting oneself to the gaze
of the camera, the reach of the
microphone or the lights of the
stage conjures a nightmarish
prescience in some, just as it
engenders an almost lustful
flight of fancy for others.
But we are complicated beasts;
confused compounds of
projected familial aspirations,
inner desires and outward
appearances. The semblance
of bashfulness or extroversion
hardly equates to a resolved
behavioural or psychological
state. The troubled, shambolic
lives of countless of our most
renowned dramatic and
musical icons would seem to
render the correlation between
public face and personal
fulfilment perilously tenuous.
Appearances can often
be deceiving.
It’s a notion worth taking into
account when spending time
with The Painted Mirror, the
most recent body of work from
American-born artist Deborah
Paauwe. Employing the sequins,
sheen and symbology of the
child beauty pageant as its
register, this suite of staged
portraits skirt a particular
tension between public and
private. Indeed, while Paauwe’s
close-cropped, highly gestural
photographs capture her young
teen (and even younger tween)
protagonists striking various
melodramatic poses in full,
garish kitsch regalia, there
is something askew.
As with much of Paauwe’s work,
the girls’ faces are obscured and
erased from view; in this case,
via a series of handheld props,
such as vintage, hand-painted
mirrors and colourful paper fans.
It’s a telling motif. Like earlier
work, too, there are irrevocable
linkages to personal history
and autobiography here. That
Paauwe cites her part-Chinese
heritage – specifically, a cultural
sensibility of concealing one’s
emotions – as an inspiration
for the series adds an
intriguing layer.
Dan Rule is an art writer, critic, editor and publisher from Melbourne.
He writes the weekly review column ‘In the Galleries’ in The Saturday Age,
is Contributing Editor to Broadsheet Media and a Co-Director of Erm Books
and Perimeter Books.
With the face concealed, there 63
is little personal legitimacy to
these poses. Indeed, how does
one read the body without
the aid of the face? Our eyes
fall upon the details – the
position of the hand, the fall
of the hair, the subtle stain of
recently removed nail polish.
The children’s gestures,
costumes and bodies become
an almost arbitrary system of
signifiers. They resemble and
hint at emotion and joy and
reticence, but they fail to
offer confirmation.
What might have been
considered as a light-hearted
study of primping, play and
“girls being girls” is in fact far
more complex in its disposition.
These are girls are play-acting
learned femininity. They are
living out contrived drama,
emotion and behaviour of
someone else’s dream.
Dan Rule
64 65
66 Deborah Paauwe has exhibited
in over 35 solo exhibitions
and 90 group exhibitions
throughout Australia, UK,
Europe, Asia, New Zealand
and the USA. In 1999 she was
awarded a Anne & Gordon
Samstag International Visual
Arts Scholarship and in
2004 undertook a Australia
Council studio residency
in New York. She has been
commissioned to work with
Hugo Boss, Hermes, Josh
Goot, Marie Claire magazine
and recently photographed
Sarah-Jane Clarke and Heidi
Middleton from Sass & Bide
for the National Portrait
Gallery, Canberra. Her work
is represented in over 35
collections including the
National Gallery of Australia;
National Gallery of Victoria; Art
Gallery of South Australia; Art
Gallery of Western Australia
and Artbank. In 2004 Wakefield
Press published a hardcover
book on Paauwe’s work titled
“Beautiful Games” written by
Wendy Walker.
68 69
 71

70
 Marcela
Paniak
Genevieve

www.marcepani.art.pl

72 73
74 75
76 77
78 79
80 81
82 83
84 85
 Genevieve is the name which This photographs are the
I could give my grandmother; pictures of me which I shot
dignified, lofty, beautiful myself in the house; dressed in
and it does not suit to my old found clothes together with
grandmother at all. Grandma some abandoned items which
Gienia lives in an old house are rediscovered by me. I join
that is too big and too them, try to be compatible and
important to have anything I dream of being back in times
changed so the walls turn that no longer exist.
into ruin and the rooms into
This home-made book with
lumber. My memories and
photographs is the gift for my
my childhood are blurred
grandmother.
somewhere in the corners of
the walls and in the backyard
bushes, they turn into dust
covering the furniture and the
old toys. Nowhere else do I
feel so much at home as there.
Grandma and I are becoming
more and more similar to each
other - as inseparable school
friends. Now I am back to
this place trying to stop time
however I know that it will
never work.

88
Marcela Paniak born in Poland 91
in Lodz is a student of National
Higher School of Film, Television
and Theatre in Lodz and a
member of Association of Polish
Artists Photographers and also
a member of Photographic
Society of Lodz. Awarded at
the numerous photographic
competitions in Poland. Already
presented her works at several
exhibitions in the country
and abroad - at the Month of
Photography in Denver, at the
Copenhagen Photo Festival
and at Les Rencontres d’Arles
festival as she has been
nominated for the Discovery
Award in Arles in 2013.
 Freya
Najade
If you are lucky,
you get old

www.freyanajade.com

Rae and Rabbie

The first evening I met Rabbie, I got up

to make a drink and I asked her: ‘Can I
make one for you too?’ And she said: ‘No,
but you can come over and kiss me.’ And
damn it, if I didn’t!
94 Rabbie’s Ashes
This July was a tough month for me. There
was our anniversary, Rabbies’s birthday, and
her day of death. Red is my favourite colour.
She hated red, I didn’t ask for the red and
they brought her ashes to me like that. After
that, I went and bought a red car.
Rae in her Armchair 95
The pain is slowly getting better, though.
I never thought it would. You tend to idealise
people who are dead. Now there is no Saint
Rabbie anymore but Saint Rae. I have to look
after myself better.
 ‘If you are lucky, you get old’. 97
This was one of the first things
elders taught me when I set off
to find out more about them. In
my surroundings and every day
life older people hardly seemed
to exist. I couldn’t feel their
presence although I knew that
they were somewhere there.
What actually happened to the
times when the old were the
wise and taught the young
about life?
In the project ‘If you are lucky,
you get old’, I tell stories of
elders I met and spent time with.
To my surprise, the older people
were not just proud of their age
and the fact that they made it
that far in life, they were also
still falling in love and breaking
up. They were overcoming their
lifetime partner’s death, living
out their erotic fantasies or
dealing with the loss of their
sexual desire. Talking to them
showed that inner growth is ever
lasting, and that humans above
the age of seventy continue to
love, suffer, long, dream and
have sexual feelings.
98 Tree in the Desert Rae 99
I loved my girlfriend very much. We were true
soul mates. I am very proud that I was with
her for 43 years.
 Tree and Water

Rabbies’s death was for me the most

devastating thing in my life. I thought I would
never get over it. I miss her so very much.
When I die, our ashes will be mixed together
and spread in the canyon.

100 Freya Najade (b. 1977 in Germany)

is a photographer living and
working in London.
 In 2009 she
received a Masters Degree with
distinction in Photojournalism
and Documentary
Photography
from the University of the Arts
London (London College of
Communication).
 Najade’s work
has been shown nationally and
internationally and was amongst
others selected for FORMAT
13, 
the Foto8 Summer Show, the
FotoGrafia Festival Rome, and the
IPA Awards. Publications of her

work include the British Journal of
Photography, The Times, Die Zeit
and Wired. 

Najade has been one of the Top50
Critical Mass Finalists in 2012.
Dominica
Paige
Lull & Splendor

www.dominicapaige.com
104
Ghosts are the inspiration for
nearly all of my work. Ghosts,
a haunting sensation, the idea
of a return, and the presence of
absence are what I continually
respond to.
Lull and Splendor is a record
of my negotiation between
the bookends of the past and
present. The haunting weight of
history on the present moment
anchors my artistic practice.
The photographs depict
solitary figures submerged in
vast, sprawling landscapes. In
frozen moments, culled from
the continuous flow of time,
these figures are engaged in
the discipline of waiting, of
anticipation.
The ghosts I was raised by 107
speak to the sentiments of
these photographs. Negotiation
between history, memory,
and the present moment is
a reconciliation with which
every individual is tasked yet
it is inherently solitary and
lonely. These scenes portray
figures in conversation with the
invisible contents of memory,
of places and people no longer
present. Quiet and lonesome,
the subjects exist in moments
where the absence of someone
is so tangible as to constitute
a separate presence. These
figures, like photographs
themselves, function as
surrogates for memory: the
ephemeral made concrete in a
finite but fleeting instant. The
drive to continually seek out that
which is absent is one of both
unending hope and desperation;
indeed, a thin line.
108
110 111
113
114 Dominica Paige is a romance
activist and a firm believer in
ghosts. A photographer and
writer, Paige is the senior editor
for Conveyor magazine and a
professor of art history. She is an
expert stone skipper, a defender
of the Oxford comma, and has
only lost at Scrabble once—by
three points. Paige holds an
MFA in Photography and Related
Media from Parsons The New
School for Design. She lives and
works in Brooklyn, NY.
117
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Ahndraya
Parlato
Towards and
Uncertain Sight

www.ahndrayaparlato.com
This work explores moments
where tensions between the
normal and the abnormal
collapse—where things cannot
be enclosed into neat containers
of either subjective or objective
realities, where the moments
of illogic, magic, mystery and
whimsy that lie just below the
surface of ordinary life are
revealed by instances of rupture
and chance.
Irrational images flash through
our minds all the time, both in
extended daydreams and in
dream state. I am interested in
the conflux of these “internal”
images with the external images
we see in the world, and how
an oscillation between the
two reveals the possibilities
of different image-realities.
As a child of a mother who 123
suffered from paranoid
schizophrenia, I am perhaps
more invested in these issues
than others. I was, from a young
age, in the unique position
of having to decide what was
“normal.” I had to constantly
assess whether her observations,
memories and fears were “real”
or “imagined.” Later, I realized
this was the same position I
was forcing my viewer into
when looking at my images.
My photographs, I realized,
allowed me to travel between
these realities, and to
acknowledge the validity
of her world.
124 125
126

128 Ahndraya Parlato was born in
Kailua, Hawaii. She has a B.A. in
photography from Bard College
and an MFA from California College
of the Arts. Her work consists
of large and medium format,
color photographs that explore
the ambiguous nature of reality,
often revealing the uncanny or
magical in everyday life. She has
forthcoming books with Twin
Palms Press and Études Books.
Among other places, her work
has been shown in The Helsinki
Biennale, the International
Fashion and Photography Festival
in Hyéres, France, at 9W Gallery
and at ClampArt in New York City.
Ahndraya is a 2013 Magenta
Foundation Emerging Photographer
Award winner and was also
shortlisted for the 2013 MACK First
Book Award. She has also been a
Light Work grant recipient, and has
been nominated for the Paul Huf
Award from the FOAM Museum in
Amsterdam, and the SECCA Award
from the San Francisco Museum of
Modern Art.
Her work has been published in a
number of books, including New
American Landscapes, Smoke
Bath, and a Collector’s Guide to
Photography, as well as in a
number of magazines, including
Nylon, Wallpaper, Vidvinkel and
Untitled Magazine.
130 131
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133
135
136 137
139
Bertil
Nilsson
Naturally

www.bertil.co.uk
142 143
144 145
I spent a lot of time in the forest
growing up in Sweden but my
entire adult life living in the
city. Through my experiments
with dancers and circus
artists I came back to explore
nature and, maybe because
of that childhood connection,
it triggered a great sense of
adventure in me.
Naturally was born from that
inspiration to explore, both the
landscape and our role within it.
Working with the naked figure
in nature is straight forward,
there is an obvious connection
with our natural history. I’m
interested in what happens
when I introduce cultural
elements – color, shape and
dance gestures – to question
that relationship.
What fascinates me about 147
dancers, is how they use and
perfect such a large range of
movements, from the organic
to the decidely artificial, such
as pointed feet. My choice of
other elements build on that
contrast, both integrating into
the scene and serving as a focal
point. The placement and choice
of color add a symbolic layer,
creating possibly unexpected
interpretations.
Naturally is also a personal
journey of exploration for me.
My interventions took on a
theme of tension between
order and chaos. I like to
align, structure, analyse and
ultimately control – in a visual
sense – the world around me.
The dancers with their free
expression confronts me with
an opportunity to let go of a bit
of my control and let the chaos
unfold. In a way the dancer in my
work also comes to embody my
original childhood playfulness.
148
150 151
153
155
156 Bertil Nilsson was born in
Sweden, but relocated to London
in 2004 to switch from the world
of computer programming to
working in the film industry.
After a year working on large
film sets, he instead choose to
pursue photography as a more
intimate and immediate medium
to express himself.
While sharing a house in London
with circus students, Bertil
became fascinated with circus
and it naturally became a central
subject for his photography. In
2006, Bertil began a long-term
project which five years later
led to the publication of his first
book Undisclosed: Images of the
Contemporary Circus Artist.
Bertil continues to be fascinated
with movement of the human
body and also works closely
with dancers. His process
draws heavily on collaborative
relationships with his subjects.
159
Dominic
Davies
Mapping London

www.dominicdavies.com
164 I returned to London after 6
years away to find it or me much
changed and while my practice
is usually within the studio,
precise and considered ,I found
that walking and reconnecting
with the city was a fertile and
liberating way of making new
work. Initially I walked the
prescribed routes, the length of
the Northern line, the Thames,
The Meridian line , but after
some time I contrived ways to
dissect the city in other ways
.Walking from the alphabetically
first to the alphabetically last
streets in my A to Z , the route
of the highest decibel level on
a the sound map of London , an
autobiographical map , these
provided some loose structure
to my working method and the
city itself.

165
166 167
168 169
 Although his chosen subjects 171
may initially appear diverse,
whether ‘constructed’ or ‘found’
his images share common
themes and qualities. A very
precise and particular use of
colour, a confusion of scale
and ambiguous staging, all
lead the viewer to question the
authenticity of what he sees,
heightening the sense of intense
observation and control.
His work initially found a place
working with music where his
images appeared on numerous
covers for the 4AD record label
and bands such as The Prodigy
and Bauhaus.
Among other projects Dominic
shot the Queens dresses for the
Jubilee celebrations as well as
collections for Italian fashion
house Aspesi.
He was invited by Heston
Blumenthal to collaborate on
‘The Big Fat Duck Cookbook’.
for which he was awarded the
James Beard Foundation Award
for Photography.
His work has been exhibited
widely in Europe, USA ,Japan
and South Africa and his book
To Cage, a study of the European
zoo environments, is published
by Kruse Verlag.

170
172 173
Front image Ahndraya Parlato Back IMAGE Dominica Paige
Please note no image in UYW can be reproduced without the artists prior permission.
All images are protected by copyright and belong to the artist.

26 lawrenc street hello@unlessyouwill.com

maldon victoria 3463, australia www.unlessyouwill.com