MARGARET LANSINK (West Graftdijk, The Netherlands)
Biography:
Margaret received a BA from the PhotoAcademy in Amsterdam. In the past years she has exhibited her work in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, New York, Leiden, Kaunas and in her old hometown of Oldenzaal. Her work has been awarded the Dutch New Talent 2013, the Big Print Photo contest Amsterdam in 2015, Bronze Star Award for fine art book at ND Awards in 2016. In 2016 she has been rewarded with an AIR with the Kaunas Gallery in Lithuania (november 2016) and with Shiro Oni Studio in Japan (august 2017); both for her on-going project ‘the Art of Empathy’. Additionally, she often coaches young photographers in developing their signature and portfolio. Margaret also participated the year-long program of LeMasterklass of Klavdij Sluban and Nestan Nijaradze in Paris. Next to this more and more she uses film (movie) to deliver her intentions.
Artist Statement:
Who we are is often determined by our social environment and (family) history. How we build our self-esteem, often determines how we look to the outside world and how we react to the other . For Margaret, she often feels like a spectator of a play; looking from the outside in to what happens, how and why the other and she interact like they do. In her work, Margaret is exploring these relationships with her (analog) camera, trying to bridge the personal and universal. The way she photographs is purely intuitive; her images present an open and honest reflection of her own inner emotions at a certain time, space and interaction.
Borders of Nothingness:
In the infinite flow of everything, people come and go in our lives. While the presence of some can be so subtle that we hardly register when it begins or ends, with others it’s far clearer: they enter, or leave, with a bang.
In her delicate and powerful series of black and white images, Dutch photographer Margaret Lansink (b. 1961) dwells in the emotional state of transition between knowing and not knowing another person. In reaction to her daughter’s decision to suspend contact with her, Lansink uses the camera to feel out the sense of severing a connection. She photographs landscapes and nude women, often rendered mysterious or unreadable, seemingly asking: is this the moment you were gone?
Borders of Nothingness raises heavy questions regarding the presence and absence of others in our lives, engaging with our sense of loss as well as the everyday miracle of making the acquaintance of another.
Practice Statement: How does photographing on film (or using your material photographic process of predilection) inform your artistic practice?
While my way of photographing is purely intuitive, analog photography gives me the opportunity to do so. No looking back on a screen, deleting too fast and trying to make another one, better than the one before. It would distract me from my feeling and I would photograph more rationally. The dark room is the ultimate place and moment of discovery. Developing my films are like gifts that are revealed time after time. Then I scan them and edit them more or less in lightroom and / or photoshop. This May I will be joining a Masterclass of Michael Botman, a real master in analog photography and analog printing. I’m looking very much forward.
