/re-constructing space in the portraits/
Paula Miklosevic's photographic portraits collected in the cycle Ideal Place are reminiscent of the approaches used in visual anthropology or related sociological research. Their aim is to capture the aspect and thinking of young people from Eastern Europe, and can probably be expected to reflect their experience as well as the local history and its current (mis)adventures. The portraits in themsleves are absolutely indifferent, mostly standing figures in a landscape; perhaps therein lies the artist's message: people are the same everywhere, and what changes is the cultural, historical, or gender context. The accompanying texts state the name, age and place of birth of the portrayed. The protagonists of the photographs express themselves in a short sentence outlining their idea of an ”ideal place“ for living; and these are rather terse: the ideal place is ”where people understand me“, and so on.
The core metaphor is probably the word ”place“ and the ways in which it relates to the term ”space". For "place" most likely refers to a pheno- menological understanding and articulation of the world, whereas ”space“ draws on modern Cartesian definitions. Placing the characters in the setting of a rural ”idyll“ alludes to such an understanding, amplifying its contrast to the subliminal space defined by depth, expansiveness and potential danger. It seems that what is usually merely a backdrop to a photograph assumes here the role of the artist's commentary, as a kind of subjective manipulation or predestination of the potential reading of the photograph. Heidegger defines space as the ”assembly of places“ and place as the ”illumination of a wasteland“.(full article is available after purchasing a subscription - not available now)