Lublintone - the Story Behind A Tender Art

Lublin in Poland now has a photography technique named after it, the latest addition to little things that make it a special place. It’s a story of hope and love, of making it despite the odds. It’s a story of generosity and gift-giving. A story of tenderness. It's also a story of success. Here's the story of Roman Kravchenko, a tireless photographer and tender artist.

I find it amazing that people show so much kindness and interest in what I do. - Roman Kravchenko, TVP Lublin feature, aired 29 April 2016

Roman Kravchenko / Via used with permission

Roman Kravchenko, Lublin.

It can take up to five years to create a new alternative photographic technique. But it takes much longer to find a new home. Roman Kravchenko, a Ukrainian photographer, managed to achieve both.The new alternative noble photographic technique that he has created, and which he has called lublintone after the city that became his second home, combines his love for photography (and years of tireless passion-driven work) with affection for Lublin. What technique would have been born if he hadn't arrived in Lublin when he did, we will fortunately never know. His work is currently on display in the Information Center on NATO and EU in Tbilisi, Georgia.

Roman is one of many people whose lives were tragically upturned in the turbulent Euromaidan events and the annexation of Crimea to the Russian Federation in 2013/2014. It was the turning point in his life, a point of no return. Everything that he and his family owned, his house, even the collection of photos were lost in the chaos of those violent days. His house had been robbed twice. They barely escaped with their lives. He was 57 at the time, a seasoned photographer, photo reporter and historian, a husband and father. He found himself brutally uprooted, forced to leave his home and all he had loved. To start anew in these circumstances seemed like an unattainable dream. Until one day Hope finally smiled on them: he and his wife were told they could come to Poland.

They only brought two suitcases and originally planned to settle in Cracow, but bureaucratic obstacles made it impossible. What Cracow had lost, Lublin gained. The city welcomed Roman and his wife warmly, becoming their new home. Roman found employment at Workshops of Culture, a cultural institution responsible for Lublin's four largest summer festivals and many year-long educational events fostering creative learning.

Workshops of Culture have made him the supervisor of the Photography Studio dedicated to noble photography. It is located in the Hartwig Alley - a charming little corner of the Old Town named after a prominent Lublin family whose members included the famous Polish photographer Edward Hartwig. The Hartwigs had also left Moscow for Lublin escaping the October Revolution of 1917. Edward was a versatile artist who combined photography and graphic work. He took many photos of the alley now named after his family.

Roman Kravchenko

Roman runs noble photography workshops and inspiring walks in the footsteps of Edward Hartwig, teaching groups how to think about photos, perspective, angles and to help them see what may have inspired or caught the eye of artists like Hartwig. Every walk with him brings a revelation, and he breathes new interest into familiar objects and spots.

However, perhaps we would not be able to enjoy these walks now if not for his father. "You've got a camera, you've got a job," he reportedly told Roman. His father had enjoyed photography and encouraged Roman to pursue it. He made sure that Roman got his first photo reporting gig for a local newspaper. During this first job Roman, still a young boy at the time, took over 50 photos and spent all night developing them. The editor of the newspaper was satisfied, launching Roman into his life-long adventure with photography. Roman also taught history at school and for over a decade worked as a diving instructor, taking underwater photos. He recalls that daily he took around 100–200 photos, mostly images of divers, instructors and wrecks of ships. He later returned to analogue photography and Roger Fenton, who had photographed the Crimean War, became his inspiration.

Roman keeps alive noble photography at a time when technological boom and digitalisation have made photography easier, faster and perhaps a little more convenient. He lets us go back to times gone by, reminds us that photo taking is an art of deliberation and love, it grows with it, like a rose. Artists like Roman are good gardeners: they water and tend it, so it continues to bloom, gracefully.

Roman Kravchenko

Roman works with a variety of historic techniques, including wet plate collodion, orotone, verre églomisé (black painting on clear glass), ambrotype (which in ancient Greek means "immortal impression"). These techniques are time-consuming and meticulous as, for the sake of simplifying, the artist manually develops images on glass plates. They require concentration, deliberation, and patience. There is no room for retakes; what the artists make in the lab manually with chemical reagents is what they get. No photo is ever precisely the same; each is an unrepeatable work of art. Photography is a tender art that makes it possible to capture fleeting moments and revisit precious memories. It has both features of permanence that perhaps soothes the anxiety about the passage of time, but it is also fragile. Like anything, it can break, or become lost. The photos made in the techniques Roman cultivates are more durable, and yet as delicate as time spent creating memories captured in the images. This is a part of their nobility.

As Kravchenko says, "I remember that as a child, I was hypnotised by the intricate beauty of an old piece of pine tree bark - brown with black grooves. Today, I work with glass which has an even more incredible structure. It is so fragile and delicate that you need to create special conditions to secure the safety of the glass and any pictures it may carry. Memories are just as fragile, but even living in our media-infested world of advanced technologies, we pay increasingly more attention to unique works of art. An image formed from silver crystals and covered with a special colophony-based lacquer can be preserved for an unlimited time. In contrast to an ordinary photograph or print, an ambrotype never loses its colour and keeps all of its original qualities. Cases in point are the first ambrotypes created in the mid-19th century which have lasted until our times. No matter whether I make a historical ambrotype or weave stories using new images, I help the viewer escape from the ordinary world and connect with the intuitive subconscious. Conceptual photography is my fundamental orientation in art. In a world of total intuition, I use visual compositions to try to recover what has been lost over the years. Only the viewer can decide how successful are these attempts at preserving memory". ("Lublintone. Lublin –silver on glass")

And so lublintone has come to be. It is a mixed photography technique created as a result of Roman's experiments with other historic methods. Roman wanted to be able to take photographs of landscapes. Techniques like the wet plate collodion, with images on a black background, are possibly more effective as portrait photography as they are not able to distinctly capture elements such as clouds. In turn, the combination of wet plate collodion with the technique of chemical processing of silver makes it possible to capture images of architecture or landscape with great detail that may not be done with the other individual methods. In this way, lublintone has given him the tool to artistically capture Lublin, its architecture as well as gorgeous landscapes.

If you have the chance to be in Tbilisi, now is an excellent opportunity to contemplate the works of a man passionate about photography and see how his rose has blossomed over the years. The exhibition in Tbilisi will stay open until 6 November. And if you can't be there, the man himself is waiting for you in his Photography Studio in the Hartwig Alley. He will always be delighted to welcome you.

You can also see Lublin in some of his photographs here: https://www.boredpanda.com/lublin-according-to-roman-kravchenko/

Visit Roman's Facebook pages for new photos: https://www.facebook.com/kravchenko.collodion/

Roman's Exhibitions

Individual Exhibitions

2019.6.10–6.11.2019 "Lublintone. Lublin –silver on glass", Information Center on NATO and EU in Tbilisi, Georgia

2019 31.05 -30.06 "Crimea-an Unfinished Journey" Lublin, Maria Curie-Skłodowska University

2018 22.09 -30.10 "Photographic transformation", Galeria Atelier, Chełm, Poland

2017 06.07–15.07 Installation: "The photographer at work", Land Art Festiwal, Janów Podlaski, Poland.

2016 20.05–05.06, "Crimea - an unfinished journey", Revela-T analogue photography festival, Vilasar de Dalt, Barcelona, Spain

2014 15–17.08, "The photographic history of Crimean Tatars, Old Town in Lublin, Poland

2012 02.06–20.07 "Ambrotypes - Natural magic", Galeria "po 111 schodach", Lublin, Poland

2011 20.08–09.09, "Ambrotypes - Natural Magic", Kraśnik, Poland

2011 16–28.05, "Ambrotypes - Natural Magic", Galeria Atelier, Chełm, Poland.

2011, 1–14 March, "Ambrotypes - natural magic", Arsenal Art, Kiev, Ukraine.

Collective Exhibitions

2019. 05.09–20.10 "Around the portrait", exhibition of photography in the City of Gardens Gallery, Sejm Śląski Square 2, Katowice, Poland.

2019. 19.08–5.09 05.09–20.10 "Around the portrait"exhibition of photography at 2nd Days of Alternative Photography Sinfonia Varosvia, Grochowska 272, Warsaw, Poland

2018. 20.08.-26.09, Days of Alternative Photography Sinfonia Varsovia, Grochowska 272, Warsaw, Poland

2016.10. 02–29, "Crimea - an unfinished journey", Galeria "Pomost", Lublin, Poland.

2016.05.12–30 "Contemporary review of alternative and archaic photographic techniques", Wrocław, Poland.

2016.03. 02–29. "Crimea - an unfinished journey", Siedlce, Poland

2016. 03.01–30, "Contemporary review of alternative and archaic photographic techniques", Katowice, Poland.

2016. 01.16–30, "Contemporary review of alternative and archaic photographic techniques", Warsaw, Poland.

2015. 03–6.09, "Crimea - an unfinished journey" at Europejski Festiwal Smaku (European Festival of Taste), Lublin, Poland

2015. 02–28.09, "Crimea - an unfinished journey", Szczecin, Poland.

2015 17.07–25.08 "Spirituality borders on landscape", Biała Podlaska, Poland

2015 22–29.05, "Crimea - an unfinished journey", Poznań, Poland

2014–2015, "Crimea - an unfinished journey", "Atelier", Chełm, Poland

2010, "Ambrotypes", Chernivtsi, Ukraine

2010, "5", HA_RA_SHO, Evpatoriya, Crimea, Ukraine

2009, "The art of manual copying", Plast Art, Chernihiv, Ukraine.

Bibliography

"Roman Krawczenko. Lublintone. Lublin - silver on glass", Lublin City Office and Workshops of Culture in Lublin, 2019. Exhibition catalogue

· "Roman Krawczenko" Zdarzenia. TVP Lublin, 29 April 2016

http://lublin.tvp.pl/25122992/29-kwietnia-2016

· "Kreatywni" Zdarzenia. TVP Lublin, 30 January 2017

https://lublin.tvp.pl/28854766/30-stycznia-2017