Ekaterini Karanika

“A gaze that looks at you straight in the eyes sees its own landscapes. A faint smile, indicates knowledge and acceptance of the human condition. A face open and clear on the other side of irony. A modern Fayum”.

Comment of Katerina Zarokosta, author, from the online Calendar 2010 “365 friends-artists everywhere: Meetings of Images and Speech on the Internet.”
Faces of soul. These series of portraits is a work on continuity. When I started photography I thought all subjects interested me except the portrait. I slowly approached human beings, at first with dull, cloudy, dark portraits. Then suddenly I started frontal shots, clear and direct. These portraits are taken in the studio. Hidden in the darkness, I am getting invisible – the model left alone facing the bright front light. Its features fade to reveal the depth of its gaze. A pure, clear gaze. A gaze which goes through us. My goal is not to communicate with the model or “capture” its soul but to bring out the best in its face, to let appear its true essence. I try to find this very moment when the faces motionless, bathed in the light, stripped of anything superfluous yet remaining transparent. Through this whiteness, this transparency, the physical fades to reveal the spiritual.

Ekaterini Karanika