Portraits of Artists

From the bleak circumstances under communism into the westernised situation now, Lamboo has photographed his fellow artists in their very own setting. The result provides an overview of the artistic life in these countries, often revisiting the artists for several years.

Lamboo worked for this ongoing project in Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Estonia , Lithuania, Latvia, Rumania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Moldova and Transnistria. In most of these countries, as well as in the Netherlands, the portraits of the artists were presented in exhibitions.

The photographs do not show the artist at work. Instead, Lamboo captured them in unexpected settings, creating a stage effect, or the artists chose to pose in relation to their work, holding meaningful objects or attributes. The result is a series of evocative photo-portraits, sometimes showing a veiled, almost hidden figure, strong black and white contrasts, shadow patterns, surprising angles, and dramatized poses. It is the artist's eye at work. The photographs are well composed, characterizing the subject involved. They do not give a documentary registration as such, but an interpretation. The series as a whole is an atlas to the new as well as the old generation of the North, Central and East European artists depicted by an artist's lens.

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