Yiannis Logiotatides

November's Clouds

A photographic approach  

I like to watch the sky during the day. I look up and see the clouds. Their colours, their shapes, small or big, horizontal or vertical, in the endless blue of the sky. They seem like the sky's tools, always one suitable for each occasion. With these the sky seems to think when playing with sunlight, to express itself with thunder and rainbows with causing rain, storms, snow.

Many worshiped them as gods, others tried to interpret their shapes in order to predict the future or the outcome of wars or crops. Others praised them, were inspired by them like painters and poets. Claude Monet waited at his hotel window to see clouds pass by. Van Gogh told stories about clouds made of cotton and our contemporary Bertoldi expressed himself masterfully with his gigantic works covered in clouds. From the poets, the eminent Elytis and Karyotakis often mentioned them in their poems.

The sky, host to elements and phenomena but also a mirror for all that happens on earth, events not all pleasant, uses the clouds to express feelings and especially its displeasure, often its anger.

These strong feelings I try to depict in my photographic collection, by showing off their dramatic forms as expressed before and during the storm as well as afterwards with the rainbow they themselves create.

With the unique ability of the photograph to freeze the moment, a time variant turns into a constant. The momentary shape of the cloud as well as the impression and feelings it creates remain unchanged for ever: the cloud itself an immense sculpture, the form a piece of painting. More so when one peruses the picture carefully, human forms, animals, shapes and depending on one's imagination a lot more things can be seen.

The preference for Black and White photograph aims to take the viewer out of the narrow colour boundaries and set him free, both as a critic and emotionally, to form a personal degree of communication.

The clouds, however angry they may appear, force us to look up in order to see them, drawing us out of our daily routine, enhancing our self-confidence and optimism. Communication with the clouds elevates the soul.