Birthe Piontek’s New Book ‘Janus’ Available for Preorder
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In a series of recent photographic works, the artist and ECU faculty member explores limitations, transformations and kinship.
A new book of photographs by artist and ECU faculty member Birthe Piontek is available for preorder via Gnomic Book, for delivery in October.
Begun at the very end of 2019, the works in the book, titled Janus, advance Birthe’s “ongoing inquiry into the topics of memory and change,” according to a statement.
“The photographs in Janus were made in the same corner of Piontek's studio as she explores how an artist can find inspiration in the limitations of a specific space. The notion of transformation is depicted by focusing on objects like fruits, vegetables and flowers – items that are commonly associated with the traditional still-life genre.”
Although the series was started before COVID had become a global concern, Birthe says the process behind the photos somehow dovetailed with the profound isolation 2020 had in store. During lockdown, she began to cultivate individual relationships with the objects in her photos. Rather than seeing inanimate forms, she began “looking at them through the lens of a certain kind of kinship, asking them, ‘Who are you?’ and discovering that there were so many things we share,” Birthe says.
“I was almost befriending them in a way.”
Birthe says her treatment of the still-lifes rhymes with the Surrealist approach to the genre, wherein an object was never only about itself.
“I’m interested in how you can look at an object and make it a bit strange or make it stand for something more; something that points beyond objecthood, that stands for an emotion or for a state of being.”
In particular, Birthe adds, she saw, in some of her objects, a reflection of changes within herself. Shifts in her life, changing relationships and a changing body. Drawing out that similarity in the studio gave her a way to look afresh at both object and self.
“There are quite a few images where I’m playing with these vegetables or fruits as an extension of my body and discovering those objects in a new way, but by doing that also discovering my body in a new way,” she says.
A gallery of photos from Janus is available for viewing online now via Birthe’s website, or via gnomicbook.com.
Join Birthe and Chicago-based artist and educator Kelli Connell on Saturday, Aug. 28, for an artist talk about the works in Janus, and about Birthe’s practice more broadly.
Preorders for Janus are available for a limited time, and come in a variety of options, including as a package with one of two handmade, signed, limited-edition prints of works featured in Janus.