Marta Syrko is an artist and fine art photographer from Ukraine, known for her unique portraits and complex projects with social impact. Having impressive creativity, she finds her inspiration in various fields of art, architecture, and conceptual and traditional art, capturing the viewer through memorable scenes and cinematic images and creating illusion and mystery in her portraits.
In recent years Marta has exhibited her work in Paris, London, Arles, and Linz and is currently based in Amsterdam, where she is developing new projects.
Hello, Marta,
First of all, I would like to thank you for taking the time to tell us about you and your work in this interview.
To begin, where are you from? Please tell us about yourself and your passions.
I’m from Lviv, Ukraine. I was studying at the Academy of Arts in my native city here in Ukraine.
What inspired you to approach photography? How did this journey start?
My first exhibition has been presented to people when I was 16 years old, I started to take pictures at this age.
My passion was people’s portraits that tell about their feelings and emotions about their lifestyle.
Please tell us what photographic equipment you use.
It’s a huge variety of tools and materials and equipment as analog and digital water colour painting over the pictures. Now I have a digital camera such as a Canon r5.
What does light mean to you?
Everything. It’s a really honest reply because the light is everything in photography if you cannot feel the light you cannot see the variety of options that are available in your picture.
You create unique portraits, and visions resulting from the interaction of light with different accessories. How did you discover your passion for portraiture? What do you want to convey to the viewer by creating illusion and mystery in your artworks?
I like to make pictures more abstract to use different angles and showing or even combining Renaissance style with contemporary lines to make them more mysterious.
Can you tell us how a creative portrait session goes in your studio? Do you have everything predetermined or do you let yourself be led by the inspiration of the moment?
I use to combine two ways because even if you prepare and make everything works sometimes you don’t predetermine what can happen so I think that you should prepare before shooting but always remember that you can use inspiration during moments of shooting.
In many of your works, you have involved dancers and created scenes, with fabulous interactions between light, movement, and bodies. What does dance mean to you?
I love the movement of dancers' bodies and I have feelings about them that they are so soft like the wind. I cannot express how hard is to move as they can, so for me, it is about inspiration
In 2019, your “Light Dance” project was presented in Paris at the ImageNation Paris exhibition. Please tell us about the essence of this unique photographic project.
It was my first experience working with dancers.
We made this shoot in my hometown with actors and I made pictures from my studio’s windows.
In 2020 you created the "Sun's Children" series, a series of portraits of children with Down syndrome, to raise awareness and facilitate their integration into society. What can you tell us about your social projects and especially this series? What impact have these portraits had?
It was the first fashionable art shoot with children with Down syndrome in Ukraine, I wanted to show people that these children are also artistically talented and they can be actors or models they can be so honest and creative with us.
The "Diversity You" project rethinks the concept of beauty, trying to draw attention to people's perceptions of those who suffer from a physical illness or have a disability. Do you think that, globally, people have lost their humanity? Do you think that through art we can draw attention to these emotional and empathetic shortcomings?
I believe that all people can feel good and believe in their ability to have a great life and to be beautiful.
What does photography mean to you? Do you think an artist should reinvent herself or move forward with what she feels and does best?
My photography is about my vision of what I’m looking forward to, what surrounds me, and how I see this.
An artist creates. Do you think we need that to know ourselves and to feel whole?
No, I think whoever wants to feel will do it.
Do you have a favorite photographer that you appreciate and who has influenced your photographic journey?
A lot of them, a lot of artists, just different styles and things.
I cannot name a couple of them.
Which of your own project do you prefer and why? How important do you think projects are in the development of an artist?
Now it’s about the injuries of soldiers from my country. My use of photography to address social issues indicates that she is also engaged in exploring contemporary concerns and questions surrounding identity, representation, and the body. By investigating the human body as a marker of identity in its imperfection, I’m likely challenging conventional notions of beauty and perfection, and highlighting the diversity and complexity of human experience.
By exploring the theme of loss and its impact on perception. By working with soldiers who have lost parts of their bodies in war, I’m likely seeking to understand how the experience of loss can alter a person's perspective and influence the way they see the world.
The project may involve documenting the soldiers' stories and experiences, as well as capturing their physical transformations and the ways in which they adapt to their new circumstances.
Through this work, I want to ask such questions: How does losing a limb or experiencing other forms of physical trauma change a person's outlook on life? How do these changes affect their relationships and interactions with others? How do they adjust to their new reality and find meaning in their lives?
How do you imagine the evolution of your artistic work and your figure as an artist in the future?
I will take a lot of work.