Description
OD Photo Prize 2024 | Runner Up
Wysocka / Pogo are now represented by Open Doors Gallery in the UK
Magdalena Wysocka and Claudio Pogo are an artist duo working in the fields of photography, photobooks, research and archives. Magdalena Wysocka, born in 1987 in Jaworzno, Poland, earned her MA in Printmaking with Honours from the Academy of Fine Arts in Katowice in 2012. Claudio Pogo, born in 1978 in Freiburg, Germany, pursued studies in Fine Arts and Photography in Bremen and Cinematography in Berlin.
Artist Statement | ““It Will Keep Growing and Falling Apart” is a series of prints on canvas inspired by the life of Ann Hodges from Sylacauga, Alabama. At 2:46 PM on November 30, 1954, while Hodges was napping on her couch, a nine-pound meteorite crashed through the ceiling of her home, struck her radio, ricocheted, and hit her in the stomach. This 4.5-billion-year-old meteorite left a severe bruise in the only well-documented case of a person being struck by a rock from space. A fragment of this meteorite, initially deemed worthless, was recently sold at Christie’s auction, fetching a price higher per gram than gold.
A meteorite is defined as a mass of solid matter, smaller than an asteroid, traveling through space as a discrete unit or having landed on Earth while retaining its identity. Scientific understanding of meteorite falls largely relies on eyewitness accounts of fireballs and meteorite landings. Giant meteors that deposit meteorites on Earth are often observed over areas spanning hundreds of miles and are witnessed by numerous lay observers. Typically, even the closest witnesses to the fireball do not see the stone or iron reach the ground. However, many meteorites have been recovered by observers who saw the impact. The sacred stone embedded in the Kaaba at Mecca is believed to have fallen from heaven, exerting a profound influence on a large population (H.H. Nininger, “Out of the Sky”).
Wysocka and Pogo work almost exclusively with found photography, often seeking and collecting images within the context of science. The source material for this body of work includes scientific textbooks such as “The Project Physics Course Handbook: Concepts of Motion,” resources from the ETH Library in Zürich, and “Out of the Sky: An Introduction to Meteoritics” by meteorite collector and scientist H.H. Nininger.
The series is inspired by the theory that collisions do not destroy but create things, and the role of chance and accident play in our lives. As Lucretius stated, “If (particles) would not swerve, then everything would fall straight down like raindrops through the void; no collisions would take place, and Nature never would have produced anything at all.“ — Wysocka / Pogo
_
All print enquiries:
tom@opendoors.gallery
+44 (0)7769922824
