Me against myself

Almost every personal website has a "biography" or "ars poetica" part, so first I was planning to follow the trend. Later I changed my mind. If I found the genre of interview so useful to dedicate a whole column to it, why not use it for this purpose too?


BTL: Starting with the most important and, of course, the most stereotypical question: how did you begin photographing?
BG: Just about ten years ago, I got an issue of the National Geographic Magazine, with Jim Brandenburg's North Woods Journal, which follows the photographer's 90 day quest for the "ultimate picture". To be precise, he wanted to take one and only one shot each day, stalking on a beautiful nature reserve. He published ninety wonderful pictures in the magazine, and that set me on track. I wanted to compete. So I borrowed my parents' Praktica and started to photograph almost everything interesting in our small garden.

BTL: Straight way to nature photography...
BG: Yes, I believed too. In the first years - while completing a mathematics course at the Eötvös Loránd University of Sciences - it seemed to be so. Beginning with negatives, continuing with slides I quickly caught up with the nature photography community of Hungary, and in 2003 I won the national competition is nature photography.

BTL: Well, that's a good start, what's next?
BG: Somehow I realized, that I am not the nature photographer type of man. Others enjoy staying in their blinds for days waiting for the miracle to happen. I mostly shot macros, landscapes, and more and more frequently: people. I worked for Hungarian magazines, but after three years of work I saw, one can indeed photograph people without even trying to understand them. That's the "philosophy" of the daily work.

BTL: That doesn't sound too good. But experience is still experience, even when it leaves not so good feelings.
BG: Well, I learned some useful techniques, met interesting people, so it wasn't so bad. Meanwhile I realized, that photography is rather an instrument for me, an instrument for reaching and understanding people. Earlier all I wanted was to take some great shots, and return with the feeling of a job well done. Now my main goal is to enjoy the making of the pictures, to contact people - even if I hadn't the slightest chance to take a good shot. That's some kind of taoist thing.

BTL: That's for motivation, what about inspiration?
BG: I like to play with my books. I like to immerse in other photographers' worlds, and try to understand their feelings and relations to the outside world. I try to imagine what had happened before and after the shot, how did he feel. Was it cold there? What kind of smells did he smell? How people reacted to his presence? I try to appreciate the work and effort behind the pictures. I like to read photographers' notes, and to follow the process from the early thoughts to the finished "big picture".

BTL: And finally, about your future plans...
BG: After quitting the picture editor job, it took some time to arrange my everyday things, to restructure my archives and to program this website. I have some projects that have long laid dormant, and it's time to revive them...