Janko Belaj and the Photography of the Absurd
(Marijan Grakalić, for the exhibition catalogue)
Translated by Aleksandra Imogen Ivir
“the peel of a long-eaten banana
thrown on the table
next to a ceramic vase of wilted mimosas
declares: I have lost my wings”
(Silvija Šesto)
The above verses inspired Janko Belaj to create the photograph Wilted Mimosas, which stands out as the central piece of the entire exhibition, although the other works also do not lag behind in their fundamental intention of affirming the ever-relevant and absurd sentiment of "being thrown into the world". This anachronism was readily exploited by writers and other artists of the 1950s, gathered around the theatre of the absurd, the main representatives of which were Albert Camus, Samuel Beckett and Ionesco. In his own unique way, Belaj follows the sensibility that prevailed there. In his photographs, meaningless observations of simple activities and processes, the daily banalities, become the subject of the artistic intervention, the playing with the mechanics of light, resulting in the old and well-known anxiety transpiring from the photographs mostly of still lifes, which, in the words of the author, are neither work nor life.
In a way, Belaj's photographic process in this cycle follows the cues seen in his earlier exhibition Food and Drink (2013), where he also flirted with the witticisms of the absurd in the portrayal of gastro-sophic delicacies. Back then, his photography required the involvement of the viewer to, at least in a metaphorical way, "complete" the photograph, or rather its message. For instance, a photograph of chicken drumsticks on a plate is not chicken soup, but it could, of course, become one. In the current cycle entitled What I Am Doing When I Am Not Working, the author's approach is far more refined and subtle. The ideas of any kind of mental or artistic "completion" or "affirmation" have been abandoned. Instead, each scene presents itself as a rich yet aesthetically perfect absurdity, affirmed by the declaration that the clichés we observe are merely a sequence of absurdities that surround us.
The photographic processes discussed here, which seek to break the usual procedure in the photographic art form, are illustrated by the author himself through such examples as the questions of whether an LED lamp may suffice to light a scene for a photograph or whether a cheap magnifying glass from a soldering kit can be sufficient for framing. Of course, Belaj executes this with great precision and perfection, but, as in the theatre of the absurd, this serves to disrupt the established way of photographing more or less significantly, at times even radically, in order to achieve the aspired, not only on a mental level but also on a technical one: an unconventional expression of visual art that photographs everything - the real as well as the unreal.