Maurice is a young photographer currently based in the Hague, Netherlands. He captures moments in time that will never come back. He is in constant search for the simplest, most mundane things, things that anyone can relate to as they evoke memories of the familiar. Something from the past that is quite moving and intimate.
Tell us a few words about you.
I live and work in the Hague and I am currently studying photography at the Royal Academy of Art here in the Hague. I am fascinated by the relationship we have with personal photographs and the role photography plays in our (unconscious) longing to stop time.
What motivates you when you take pictures?
I like the fact that you can take a picture of a moment in time that will never come back. I like to search for images that possibly make you think of the “before” and “after” moment. So the picture refers to actions that cannot be seen in the picture itself but requires imagination to come alive. “When you’re standing on the street you sometimes pick up a line out of a story when strangers pass. A photograph is nothing more than that.” After spending quite a time on the street, actually busy with forced subjects, I decided to point my camera at things which I have a natural relationship with: my own life, my family and friends. This is where photography works best for me.
What is your biggest ambition?
I would love to find a way to travel time.
How many shots does it take to make one good photograph?
I recently heard Morrissey saying “Time will prove everything”. You could apply that to photography too. It’s hard to decide if a photograph is good now. For me it’s more important to make pictures I would love to see 3, 5 or 10 years later. So they stand for a time or situation I was in. This way the picture becomes a door to the past. A past you already had forgotten when there was no picture of it. In the act of taking pictures I photograph a lot and I am open for the most simple things I see.
Future plans?
Next year I’m going to graduate. I want to develop my work in 3d work. Like building installations with my photos. I also would like to really finish all the works I’ve started.
What project are you working on at the moment?
In my latest work I try to make 2011 last forever. I would like to find a new way of documenting life that could apply for other people too. I hope the work balances between taking time to look and the obsessively fear to not forget.
Tell us a few words about your ‘Blank Starting points’ project.
Blank Starting Points is part of the project I’m making about leaving my parental house. At this moment my brother is the only one who still lives there, but in 3 years everything will completely gone. I am interested in the relationship between people and a place they have lived for a certain period. What inspired me to make this project is the traces one leaves that you always see in a house. I love to look at those traces because they refer to actions of the past. The pictures prove that things have happened, also when they are forgotten.
Inspirational photographers?
When I look at photos I like to be aware of the idea that every picture you see has been taken by a person with a camera. Thinking what has driven the person to make the picture fascinates me. I think Anna Fox and Nigel Shafran are especially aware of this. I love their work for this reason. Good example is the series “Ruth on the phone” by Nigel Shafran. Here photography works on both sides of the camera. You see Shafran’s girlfriend getting older as the environment is constantly changing. But what struck me the most was that there was somebody who pointed his camera at this every time, being conscious that the everyday scene he was facing one day will be an unreachable past. I love their attempts and I can relate to them very well.
mauricevanes.nl
by Gelly Siganou/source: OZON RAW is#98
