The set of images in this series are a celebration and an appreciation of silence and tranquillity, which is always the source of my inspiration. Sometimes when we talk about ‘subject’ we give the impression that we’re dealing with a physical definable object, like a tree or a boat. Silence is a presence that cannot be seen, thus with my work I try to convey that feeling. Silence and Darkness are both elements in their raw state and both are the absence of another opposing element. While darkness is the absence of light, silence is the absence of sound.
This time, when speaking of silence, I am not referring only to the absence of sound around me, but also about the quietness of my thoughts inside my head; a form of meditation where I sit and just observe in total absorption of ‘the now’. We live most of our life, lived in a sort of fog of habitual behavior, and most of the time we live on the hunt; so immersed in this vacuum that we end up living on autopilot, and forget about that peace which resides within us. With my work, I try to create a scene where I can escape from all this pandemonium.
Shooting a wreck found in Ras Hanzir.
Before & After - with LEE10 IRND
The images in this series were shot during the Covid-19 pandemic. Malta, like most of the world, was and still is in partial lockdown. Although it is a catastrophic event, it has put me in a creative mood, and in a mindset of solitude and total isolation. Since we are only on partial lockdown, and authorities advised the population to keep social distancing, I kept going out for my regular shoot, visiting all the potential locations which I had previously scouted.
I often find inspiration in ordinary subjects, sometimes the subject is so mundane that it is overlooked by other traditional photographers. I want my images to reflect my personality, my ideas, and my way of looking at life, which is exactly in sync with the present situation all over the globe.
Slowing Time in Delimara.
I like to process my images according to my personal vision. The shot itself would have been pre-visualized before the actual registering on the sensor, but the setting of the mood and feeling is created in the digital darkroom. I like my images to be soft and ethereal, almost walking away from reality and bordering into a parallel universe, where the photographer and also the viewer, who is the final consumer of my vision, can escape in a space created only as a refuge. The negative space in the scene is treated as an abstract mass, which sometimes helps the viewer to get lost and look for usually the small subject within the frame.
The long exposure effect gives the image a timeless feeling, smoothing out all the textures, almost like a time machine slowing time, making the scene even more surreal. With this effect, the image is far from reality and from what the human eyes can see; the black & white toning elevates the image in the same realm.
A concrete block found along the coast of Qawra.
As a photographer living on a very small island, where ‘good locations’ are very limited, I feel I manage to grab a different perspective of the locations I visit, and sometimes I feel it is very difficult to go back home with a different perspective or mood recorded on the camera sensor. But this offers a real challenge and makes my work more appreciative, and every time I manage to get an image which I had planned and transforming it into my vision puts me in a motivated mood to keep on scouting, I am sure there are hundreds of un-scouted locations which I might have missed.
Keith Ellul