By Lesia GANZHA, The Day
Light and darkness were divided at the very beginning of the creation of
the world, but Eugen Bavcar, a blind photographer, has to repeat this superhuman
act every time he pushes the camera button: that moment, in total darkness,
gives birth to an image woven from light and shadows. The exhibition of
Eugen Bavcar, a Slovene living in France, is called Down the Roads of Balzac
and dedicated to the bicentennial of the great writer's birth. It displays
a series of photos of the Balzac Museum in Paris and of the Sachet Castle
(near Tours). Incidentally, this is a preview, for the premiere as such,
complemented with the photos made at Eveline Hanska's manor (photography
at Verkhivnia is the purpose of Bavcar's visit to Ukraine), is to take
place in November at Sachet Castle. Although Eugen Bavcar's first photo
show in 1987 and following worldwide exhibitions had resounding success,
it is not enough to call him simply a photographer: he is also a philosopher
(graduated from the Sorbonne in 1976), historian, and writer. He lost his
sight at the age of 11, when he was taking down a mine fuse. Since then,
light and colors have remained forever in his childhood as well as dreams.
Speaking of his photographs, Eugen Bavcar notes philosophically that "blind
photographer" only sounds paradoxically at first glance: "No one knows
what things are really like because we are all blind to some extent."







