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Sanan Aleskerov
Interview
Sanan Aleskerov, the “biophile” photographer
One of the features that make photography particularly interesting is that it is halfway between informative documentary and artistic creation. It is this bivalency that makes it so enriching, in particular when the photographs in question reflect the life of a country such as Azerbaijan.
Sanan Aleskerov is one of the towering figures of Azerbaijani photography. Here he tells us of his career up until now and gives us his point of view on photographic creation in Azerbaijan and the rest of the world. For Aleskerov, only truth must be predominant in art…
The learning years
Sanan Aleskerov was born in Baku in 1956. With a smile, he adds that he has always lived here and always will. After graduation from the school of journalism, he joined the TASS news agency as a photographer. After a year and a half, he decided to leave this job and give up documentary photography in order to turn to artistic photography. During his brief experience as a photographer-journalist, Aleskerov had been, like all his colleagues, subject to orders from the State. In Soviet society, there were very clear dividing lines between what was “good” and what was “evil”. This made the ever-present censorship oppressive and therefore unbearable for the young photographer.
The famous Azerbaijani photographer says that he has never benefited from any real training, despite his university education. He was given his first camera at the age of 12: it was a birthday gift from his mother. For a long time, the camera was barely every used. He was bitten by the photography bug during his military service. Like many other young conscripts, Sanan Aleskerov read pornographic magazines. The photos of naked women fascinated him because of the aesthetics of the lines, the curves, the colors and the interplay of light and shadow. The young man then chose to pursue his interest in photographic art by reading specialist reviews, many of which came from abroad (Czechoslovakia, United States, etc.). It is for this reason that Aleskerov regards himself as self-taught. Moreover, artistic photography as a discipline was not taught at university and was indeed almost banned in the Soviet Union.
Teacher-photographer
Today, Sanan Aleskerov’s renown is international. He has traveled widely and presented exhibitions all over the world. Having said that, over the last ten years or so, he has been participating steadily less in this kind of international event. He explains that his photos are somewhat out of place when compared to what is currently fashionable. He has taken to getting his pleasure from transmitting his know-how to the younger generations, through a workshop he runs and in which he gives private lessons.
His work method is based on a total freedom of action. For him, the photographer must be guided by spontaneity, must be able to make the most of the little things that life throws up. Aleskerov never plans his work, never functions on the basis of a project. The themes are born of themselves. Often photos taken on the spur of the moment remain something of a mystery for the photographer himself. Then, with time, the artist finds the key to interpret the images, these little vignettes of life.
Nowadays, the University of Baku provides real courses in photography, but they are still somewhat basic and are not very popular, because photographic art is still an expensive pleasure… The training provided by Sanan Aleskerov is classical in nature. He believes that the basics are primordial and that solid technical and historical competence is essential for the budding professional. Even the Soviet period should not be set aside. It gave rise to a tradition, whether good or bad, but which is now an integral part of the contemporary reality and one that must not remain hidden. For some time, there was a photography school, linked to the school of journalism, and a great many photographers were trained there. It is these photographers who provided all the material for the photographic reviews and publications. Even though the general tendency was ideological, and therefore more oriented towards documentary and social aspects, some experimentation went on, and technical advances were made. Aleskerov played a huge part in this non-official reflection.
A quest for truth…
When Aleskerov left the TASS news agency, he soon joined up with artists looking out for a new form of artistic expression. Informal circles were created, and saw the creation of a number of projects that were innovative for Azerbaijan. This type of artistic circle is still in existence and Aleskerov is only too happy to continue to play a part. In particular, he has joined the “Labyrinth” artists’ collective, run by Azerbaijani artist Sabina Shikhlinskaya. He committed himself to this adventure because he felt first of all that “Labyrinth” would act as a channel for the creative inspiration of the upcoming generation of artists and secondly that it would look at subjects that were important to him, such as the environment and refugees. Alongside this, by becoming more involved in local artistic activities and pursuing his own work within the same paradigm, he has come to see the “void” that is so integral to major international events. This meeting of personalities suddenly seemed to him to be nothing but a “bourgeois salon” where he was simply out of place…
During the ten years of perestroika, photography ceased to be of much interest to most people. Political upheaval and wars became the maid fodder for television bulletins and the press. Purely documentary photography did not suffer in the same way, but the photography that had kept closer ties with its artistic tradition struggled to make an impact. Gradually, this tendency was reversed. Weary of the horrors of war, many photographers began to search for another form of truth, something with a broader horizon. That is not to say that the representation of death or misery disappeared completely, simply that the means by which these themes were dealt with changed considerably. This was particularly the case for Sanan Aleskerov who, since the beginning of his career, has been on a quest for Truth. The reality of the world we live in must be represented with emotion and sincerity. Aleskerov recounts how he took many photographs of particularly tragic scenes, the burials of war victims for example. Each time, he looked through both lens and tears.
The quest for the True or more precisely the authentic is something that Aleskerov feels is missing in so-called “Western creation”. This is a tradition with a strong interest in the macabre, so much so that it has become a dominant theme of reflection. Aleskerov combats both this taste for “necrophilia” and the system that seeks to standardize art. In his view, the “biophile” approach is the only productive one, because it is a true reflection of life, it transmits the very essence of human existence. The photo may represent a corpse, but this image must give off a pure sense of authenticity by being a part of human reality. Against the standardization, and therefore the globalization of art, Aleskerov proposes a “sideways look” at the world. To do so means being free and aware of one’s choices and desires. This required the development of an inner strength. This artist-photographer has found his by burning towards religion, or more precisely towards God, because he claims not to belong to any church.
1TASS is pretty much the equivalent of the French AFP (Agence France Presse), or Reuters.
Sanan Aleskerov
Interview
Sanan Aleskerov, the “biophile” photographer
One of the features that make photography particularly interesting is that it is halfway between informative documentary and artistic creation. It is this bivalency that makes it so enriching, in particular when the photographs in question reflect the life of a country such as Azerbaijan.
Sanan Aleskerov is one of the towering figures of Azerbaijani photography. Here he tells us of his career up until now and gives us his point of view on photographic creation in Azerbaijan and the rest of the world. For Aleskerov, only truth must be predominant in art…
The learning years
Sanan Aleskerov was born in Baku in 1956. With a smile, he adds that he has always lived here and always will. After graduation from the school of journalism, he joined the TASS news agency as a photographer. After a year and a half, he decided to leave this job and give up documentary photography in order to turn to artistic photography. During his brief experience as a photographer-journalist, Aleskerov had been, like all his colleagues, subject to orders from the State. In Soviet society, there were very clear dividing lines between what was “good” and what was “evil”. This made the ever-present censorship oppressive and therefore unbearable for the young photographer.
The famous Azerbaijani photographer says that he has never benefited from any real training, despite his university education. He was given his first camera at the age of 12: it was a birthday gift from his mother. For a long time, the camera was barely every used. He was bitten by the photography bug during his military service. Like many other young conscripts, Sanan Aleskerov read pornographic magazines. The photos of naked women fascinated him because of the aesthetics of the lines, the curves, the colors and the interplay of light and shadow. The young man then chose to pursue his interest in photographic art by reading specialist reviews, many of which came from abroad (Czechoslovakia, United States, etc.). It is for this reason that Aleskerov regards himself as self-taught. Moreover, artistic photography as a discipline was not taught at university and was indeed almost banned in the Soviet Union.
Teacher-photographer
Today, Sanan Aleskerov’s renown is international. He has traveled widely and presented exhibitions all over the world. Having said that, over the last ten years or so, he has been participating steadily less in this kind of international event. He explains that his photos are somewhat out of place when compared to what is currently fashionable. He has taken to getting his pleasure from transmitting his know-how to the younger generations, through a workshop he runs and in which he gives private lessons.
His work method is based on a total freedom of action. For him, the photographer must be guided by spontaneity, must be able to make the most of the little things that life throws up. Aleskerov never plans his work, never functions on the basis of a project. The themes are born of themselves. Often photos taken on the spur of the moment remain something of a mystery for the photographer himself. Then, with time, the artist finds the key to interpret the images, these little vignettes of life.
Nowadays, the University of Baku provides real courses in photography, but they are still somewhat basic and are not very popular, because photographic art is still an expensive pleasure… The training provided by Sanan Aleskerov is classical in nature. He believes that the basics are primordial and that solid technical and historical competence is essential for the budding professional. Even the Soviet period should not be set aside. It gave rise to a tradition, whether good or bad, but which is now an integral part of the contemporary reality and one that must not remain hidden. For some time, there was a photography school, linked to the school of journalism, and a great many photographers were trained there. It is these photographers who provided all the material for the photographic reviews and publications. Even though the general tendency was ideological, and therefore more oriented towards documentary and social aspects, some experimentation went on, and technical advances were made. Aleskerov played a huge part in this non-official reflection.
A quest for truth…
When Aleskerov left the TASS news agency, he soon joined up with artists looking out for a new form of artistic expression. Informal circles were created, and saw the creation of a number of projects that were innovative for Azerbaijan. This type of artistic circle is still in existence and Aleskerov is only too happy to continue to play a part. In particular, he has joined the “Labyrinth” artists’ collective, run by Azerbaijani artist Sabina Shikhlinskaya. He committed himself to this adventure because he felt first of all that “Labyrinth” would act as a channel for the creative inspiration of the upcoming generation of artists and secondly that it would look at subjects that were important to him, such as the environment and refugees. Alongside this, by becoming more involved in local artistic activities and pursuing his own work within the same paradigm, he has come to see the “void” that is so integral to major international events. This meeting of personalities suddenly seemed to him to be nothing but a “bourgeois salon” where he was simply out of place…
During the ten years of perestroika, photography ceased to be of much interest to most people. Political upheaval and wars became the maid fodder for television bulletins and the press. Purely documentary photography did not suffer in the same way, but the photography that had kept closer ties with its artistic tradition struggled to make an impact. Gradually, this tendency was reversed. Weary of the horrors of war, many photographers began to search for another form of truth, something with a broader horizon. That is not to say that the representation of death or misery disappeared completely, simply that the means by which these themes were dealt with changed considerably. This was particularly the case for Sanan Aleskerov who, since the beginning of his career, has been on a quest for Truth. The reality of the world we live in must be represented with emotion and sincerity. Aleskerov recounts how he took many photographs of particularly tragic scenes, the burials of war victims for example. Each time, he looked through both lens and tears.
The quest for the True or more precisely the authentic is something that Aleskerov feels is missing in so-called “Western creation”. This is a tradition with a strong interest in the macabre, so much so that it has become a dominant theme of reflection. Aleskerov combats both this taste for “necrophilia” and the system that seeks to standardize art. In his view, the “biophile” approach is the only productive one, because it is a true reflection of life, it transmits the very essence of human existence. The photo may represent a corpse, but this image must give off a pure sense of authenticity by being a part of human reality. Against the standardization, and therefore the globalization of art, Aleskerov proposes a “sideways look” at the world. To do so means being free and aware of one’s choices and desires. This required the development of an inner strength. This artist-photographer has found his by burning towards religion, or more precisely towards God, because he claims not to belong to any church.
1TASS is pretty much the equivalent of the French AFP (Agence France Presse), or Reuters.