Home photo club as an alternative to online community

For the past six months a club for amateur photographers “12p.m.” has been open in Donetsk. The club organizes movie and photo nights, publishes a photo magazine and invites amateurs and professionals to watch documentaries about photo making. It all started with a kvartyrnyk (home club), when every Saturday several amateur photographers – Viktor Zasypkin (Korvik), Roman Yukhymchuk, Denys Kutsevalov, Svitlana Zhatkina, and Viacheslav Sokolov gathered in someone’s home over a cup of tea and discussed theory and practice of photography. They also invited guests – both photographers from Donetsk and from abroad. Now the club has moved to the Donetsk Youth Library. This group is, perhaps, one of the examples of how a thematic community can operate not online, like we all got accustomed to do lately, but in real life. The Day discussed the prospects of this community with one of its creators, photographer and architect Viktor KORVIK.

Why did you decide to open a photo club?

“We love to take photos and then to look through and discuss the photos of each other. It is interesting for us to understand what happened and what is now happening in the world of photography. That is, first: we had the need to communicate on these topics. Second: some photographers whose work we observed through the livejournal, inspired us by their experience of organizing home photo clubs and exchanging of photos (an attempt to compensate for the lack of photography market). The third would be the desire to do it systematically. This is how we got the idea of regular meetings. Roman Yukhymchuk and I knew that there was a photo club in the city that has its regular meetings. However, from their exhibitions it was obvious that our tastes and aspirations in photography are quite different. As a result, we gathered friends, who are interested in photographing, and started to have meetings where we drank tea and discussed photography and sometimes even developed photos by old-school methods.”

What can you tell about Donetsk in photographs? What is it like?

“It is different just like the people living in it. It can be beautiful, sparkling with the lights of its new shopping centers and central squares, and it can be dull, like a way from home to work. There are already too many nice shots of city sites, that’s why we decided to look at the other side of city life and recreate the atmosphere of the suburbs in the photos of the three participants of the project. In the first Zhuzhalka [group’s magazine. – Author] we showed the part of the city that probably resembles off-center areas of other big cities of the former Soviet Union which has the fitting name Proletarsky. Perhaps, only people that live in other cities would be able to say whether we managed to show at least a small part of the Donbas.”

What is photography for you – document or art?

“Fifty-fifty. And these proportions are constantly changing depending on the task of the photo shoot. For me, a photograph is an instrument for discovering yourself and the world around you, which means it is both a document and a piece of art.”

At your meetings you show films about famous photographers, discuss your photographs. How important is it for a person engaged in photography to know its history?

“Without knowing what was done in the past, it is difficult to make something really new. Learning about the history helps to understand for what purposes you can use photography, and studying the works of the masters helps to enrich your arsenal of principles, methods, and techniques for expressing ideas, feelings, and images.”

What is the future of “12p.m.”?

“The plans for the future include development for both the members of the group and the guests, who join us in watching films and our discussions. We want to finally make the second and third issue of Zhuzhalka. At some point we would like to invite photographers from other cities and countries for creative meetings and exhibitions.”

Today there is a trendy network for sharing photos called Instagram, where everyone can share photos that present his life. In your opinion, why are such photos so popular? Is it possibly a competition for classic photography?

“Instagram is like Twitter for those who would rather express themselves through photos than words. For an average person it is certainly a great advantage that any image can be made aesthetic in just a few clicks and it all can be done right on his device and then published online. Interestingly, professional photographers also use it. For example, Heorhii Pinkhasov and Oleksandr Strinadko use this application for their photographs.”

The Day has held a photo contest for amateur and professional photographers for 15 years. The goal of the contest is to show life of Ukraine and Ukrainian people. By doing this we create the country’s history in photos. Do you agree that it is possible to show the real world through photographs?

“I have heard about The Day’s Photo Contest but never participated in it. Maybe this year I will join the contest. In my opinion, it is a good opportunity for professional growth. Contests give stimulus and potential, they give the feeling of competition. What concerns the overall picture, it all depends on who has the camera or the keyboard, what is the inner world of this person and desires. One photo can kill a person the way a word can.”