Tanja Verlak
PhD Work
PhD work
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Midnight in Mumbai, 2012, silver gelatin print, 83 x 83 cm, Tanja Verlak
Via Fotografia: Appearance and Apparition
Via Fotografia: Appearance and Apparition addresses an artistic research practice based on the ontology and phenomenology of the photographic image. It presents a series of photographs entitled Midnight in Mumbai and considers the act of photographing by examining the phenomenological aspect of photography arising directly from Verlak’s artistic practice. By looking into the prehistory of photography Verlak consider the idea of photography before the medium’s actual materialisation in the 1830s; which predominated in literary fiction and experimental scientific texts and informs us about how the medium was initially understood, discussed and defined. Expanding upon André Bazin’s essay ‘The Ontology of the Photographic Image’, Verlak consider the discourse of the early history of the medium to be vital in informing the ontological questions developed in the thesis.
Taking photography’s early history as a point of departure, the research looks into the possible manifestations of thinking photographically, and asks whether we can only photograph what we know already. This relationship of the photographic image to the world frames the enquiry into the domain of photography as a phenomenological gesture.
The title of the thesis refers to the speculative history of the medium and to Verlak’s own photographic work. Like the nineteenth-century photographers who tried to photograph the spirit of a human being, the photographs aim to allude to what might not be apparent by evoking a vision of seeing things that are invisible. The expression ‘via fotografia’ is used as a method of making phenomena visible photographically. As a medium based on reality that can reflect the world, however visible or invisible that might be, photography continuously questions our perception of such reality. Do we photograph what we see, or what we think and imagine? This is not to suggest that the acts of photographing and thinking are the same, but rather to propose that they are not separate from each other. Photographs, in that sense, are not experienced in terms of their appearance, but in terms of their continuous appearing.Info
Info
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PhD
School
School of Arts & Humanities
Programme
Photography, 2011–2018
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Contact
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Tanja Verlak’s ongoing investigation into the historical projection and the contemporary unfolding of the photographic image as the agent between the world and a person, aims to draw analogies between the nineteenth century optical illusions and contemporary visions produced in the immaterial state of virtual reality. The transformation of the technical image from a trace of light to a flow of electrons – from reflection to emanation – opens up the space of images within images. In that sense, giving yourself to an image is to walk into a time and space of magic, which introduces a reality different from an empirical one and for this, metaphorically speaking, we give ourselves to photography over and over again.
Residing between New Delhi and New York for several years, Verlak gave talks at the invitation of the International Center of Photography – ICP, the St. John's University New York, Mass Communication Research Centre New Delhi, and the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts – SASA, Ljubljana.
Verlak is a recipient of the Fulbright Fellowship.
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Degrees
- PhD, Royal College of Art, London; M.Phil, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; MA, Academy of Performing Arts – AMU/FAMU, Prague; BA, Academy of Performing Arts – AMU/FAMU, Prague
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Experience
- The British School at Rome, Royal College of Art artist-in-residence, Rome, 2014; Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, London, 2014; Lieber Aby Warburg, was tun mit Bildern?, Museum of Contemporary Art Siegen, 2012; French Institute of Design and Communications Arts, Bombay, 2012; International Center of Photography – ICP , New York City, 2009; Devi Art Foundation, Gurgaon, 2009; Jamia Millia Islamia University, AJK Mass Communication Research Centre, New Delhi, 2008
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Exhibitions
- Precarious Environments, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Ljubljana; 2018; Photo London; Works from the Museum’s Collection, City Gallery Nova Gorica, 2018; The Most Beautiful Place in the World, Klovicevi dvori, Zagreb, 2016; Let’s go Onwards! Slovenian Photography 1990–2015, City Gallery, Ljubljana, 2016; Field of View | Sichtfeld – das Eigene und das Fremde, Kunstverein Kärnten, 2016; Intersections, Office in Tel Aviv Gallery, Tel Aviv, Israel, 2016; Towards Neutral | Vers le neutre, Centre d’art et photographie de Lectoure, 2015; Offprint, Tate Modern, 2015; AIPAD, New York, 2014; Texas Contemporary Art Fair, Houston, 2013; They are Us: Animal Identity and the Anthropomorphic Urge, Rick Wester Fine Art, New York, 2013; New F, Tendencies in Slovene Photography, UGM Maribor Art Gallery, 2012; It’s a Woman’s World of Photography, Gallery of Riko Debenjak, 2011; Paris Photo, 2011; Paris Photo, 2010; PhotoSpeaks, Go Eun Museum of Photography, Busan, 2009; No Photo, Obalne galerije Piran, 2009; Vanishing Points : The Vicious and Virtuous Circle, London, 2008; Differently, National Museum of Photography, Jindrichuv Hradec, 2004
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Awards
- Fulbright Fellowship; International Photography Awards, honorable mention, Los Angeles, 2012; Tata Grant, New Delhi, 2011; Lucie Foundation Scholarship, shortlisted, New York, 2010; Photo Annual, PDN, nominee, New York, 2008; a double recipient of the National Significance Award, Ljubljana, 2006 and 2003; Soros Grant, New York/Budapest, 2004; Zois Scholarship for Talented Students in Sciences and Arts, Ljubljana, 2001
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Publications
- “Via Fotografia – Apparent and Apparition”, Tanja Verlak: Via Fotografia, Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Ljubljana; ; “’Soft’ Shooting?, Tanja Verlak in Conversation with Sandra Križić Roban”, Camera Austria International, 150/15; “Vlasta Delimar: This is I: Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb”, Tanja Verlak, Camera Austria International, No. 127; “Excavation Thrill”, Tanja Verlak, Now is Were, No. 12, London and Folio, Vol. 5, 6, Maribor; “An Attempt at Exhausting an Archive – fpf/found photo foundation”, Tanja Verlak, Lieber Aby Warburg, was tun mit Bildern?, Museum of Contemporary Art Siegen, DE; “Constructing a Photo-Persona”, Tanja Verlak, Forum, Journal of Slovenian Art Critics, Vol. II, No. 5, 6, Ljubljana; “Early Indian Photography”, Tanja Verlak, Forum, Journal of Slovenian Art Critics, Vol. I, No. 1, 2, Ljubljana; “Museum of Affects : in the Framework of L'Internationale: MSUM, Ljubljana”, Tanja Verlak, Camera Austria International, No. 117; “Subjektivno-dokumentarna fotografija : izbor fotografij iz opusa v letih 1999–2004”, Tanja Verlak, Borec, Journal for History, Anthropology and Literature, Vol. 57, No. 626–629, Ljubljana; “Fotografie : [k souboru cernobílych fotografií z let 2001–2004] / Tanja Verlak”, Revolver Revue, No. 59, Prague; “Tanja Verlak: fotografie 1999/2004”, Camera Austria International, No. 93, Graz.