Andrey Kezzyn shares his nightmares
By Raymond Johnston. Praguepost, 17 November 2013
Russian photographer creates fantasy images from films that will never be made
Some of the photos, at first glance, look like covers for tawdry novels or posters for b-grade horror films. They have that look of something that has been heavily retouched. There are almost no shadows. The facial expressions seem a little unreal and the details, such as horns and pig noses, or ghostly faces must have been added later. Saint Petersburg-based photographer Andrey Kezzyn begs to differ. He says that he meticulously creates each scene and does no alterations afterward. “It’s very simple. I don’t use Photoshop; it is a natural photograph. I am very technical,” he told the Prague Post. He attributes the style to several things: a good camera, a lot of assistants and helpers, good lighting, and good preparation.
Andrey Kezzyn. Why so serious?
By Luciana Acuña. Arte Al Limite 03/10/2014
From Saint Petersburg, thanks to his grandfather, the artist is interested in photography, a pastime that he considers common of the average citizen of the USSR being that “everybody had a camera like Zenit or Smena or FED, a Soviet analogue of Leica, and developed films and printed black and white photos in the bathroom, again the Soviet analogue of a darkroom. The bathroom converted into the darkroom for a couple of hours with the help of several wooden planks and red lamps and after the session was converted back into bathroom,” Kezzyn says.
Andrey Kezzyn on Widewalls
The surreal and bizarre iconography in the photographic work of Andrey Kezzyn has a central role. His series represent narratives from another world perhaps from the deepest corners of the human mind. By referring to popular culture, art or historical phenomenon’s, Kezzyn inserts several layers of meanings which make his art a reflection of political, religious and moral values of contemporary society. Prone to theatricality and grandiose settings, the artist produces staged shoots that look like leftovers of the material that was not used for the final cut off some movie spectacle.
Andrew Kezzyn: interview with the tooth fairy
Some questions to the renowned Russian photographer.
By Nicola Maronga
Sometimes all of us get those weird dreams in which you say “wtf?!” when you wake up. A mix of real life experiences and fantastic characters that we wonder how our brains were able to create. Seems like Andrew Kezzyn has the ability to frame all this in a picture. And he spend quite a lot of time to make that shareable with the world around him.
In each of his works, Andrew has an opinion to share, his point of view. His interpretation on the weirder parts of our existence, or against whatever our brains has been filled with since we born.
Or maybe, this is just my own conjecture.
Let’s see what he has to say.