Katrina
Photography (2nd and 3rd cover), 2012
„I truly desire to vomit all this out and never return to this story. To encounter this cosmic blast of natural clearance which brings almost tranquilized serenity, relieve and love towards yourself. I am entering a new chapter. Photography is too crazy for me. It came in belief to be a cure, but appeared to be a pin that kept me down with no ability to move forward. I mean I have. I might pick up an instrument now. This story started as a search for my TRUE SELF.”
The hurricane Katrina in 2005 was one of the most destructive hurricanes in the history of the USA. Ilze Vanaga’s “Katrina” is the result of over a year of looking into herself, digging through layers of impressions and assumptions she has created. This was not a photo project, rather – a process through which a book has been created, which includes photography, both by and others, magazine and book snippets, notes and drawings. Photographs, published in the SURVIVAL KIT4 newspaper are part from Vanaga’s „Katrina”.
Artist's Bio:
Ilzes Vanagas style has come about independently of Latvia’s usual (though non-academic) schools. Having finished the Department of Art History of the Art Academy of Latvia, Vanaga lived for a number of years in London, assisting recognized fashion photographers. In parallel, she began work on her own personal photo projects, or rather – personal projects, in which photography has been a reliable tool. For example, the series “Childhood is Like a Loaded Weapon” gives testimony to Vanaga’s “journey into her own past” through Katrīna – her brother’s daughter at a prepubescent age. Together with her last photography project “Katrina”, it seems that Vanaga’s relationship with photography as a media is changing: “I no longer feel comfortable calling myself a photographer. It feels inappropriate to put life in frames and for some reason I find these frames very small size. But perhaps I simply need a break.” Vanaga’s photographs have been displayed in the AOP gallery in London in the exhibition VICE/Ctrl+Alt+Shift (2009), the “Host Gallery” in the exhibition “Foto8 summershow” (2010), in the exhibition “All Photographers Now!” in the New York photo festival (2009), “The Bay Salone” in the exhibition “Please excuse the mess, Los Angeles” (2010), the Totaldobže art centre exhibition “Brīnišķīgais ceļojums” (Wonderful Journey) (2010), “Es mirstu – es dzīvoju” (I die – I live) (2011). Vanaga has created photographs for short films by Keta Gūtmane and Mārtiņš Grauds “Lust Lust” and “Creak”. Together with the fashion designer Keta Gūtmane, Vanaga has created the photographic material for her collections. Vanaga held a solo exhibition “Dažādas pasaules” (Various Worlds) at the gallery „AG7” in 2007. In 2012 the “Katrina” project in the framework of the project „Visual narrative: European borderlines” was exhibited at the Bursa PhotoFest (Turkey), Braga Photo Festival (Portugal), Iceland, Fotografia2012 (Italy) and Latvia.