DOBRA

I create photographic works that evolve out of a sculptural process. I conceive of and construct the object to be photographed. The initial conceptual impetus for a photograph is often a found image, sometimes historical, taken from the field of architecture or art. To realise my visual concept, I construct the subject matter of the photograph with the help of cardboard models and a diversity of everyday objects. Although the picture space in my photographs appears to be extremely heterogeneous and broken, the images are not photomontages in the conventional sense. The photographs bear witness to a sculptural process that took place in my studio. The disparate materials, lines of sight and levels of reality were in actual, physical contact with each other. Anamorphic models – models that have been constructed for a specific camera viewpoint, appearing distorted when another viewpoint is adopted – are often integral to this process. I am interested in systems of image organisation that don’t follow the established norms of perspective representation. The fact that a photograph, with its monocular way of viewing, is assumed to be a reproduction of reality makes the medium of photography the ideal tool for me to experiment with new ways of structuring an image. I construct images that, on first glance, follow the established laws of linear perspective. These visual traditions are like a musical score that underlies my images. When contradictory planes and lines of sight confront each other, however, their respective underlying visual systems are mutually disrupted, to the point of cancelling each other out.