FIAP GOLD MEDAL in section Water with photography SUMMER IS OVER
VINKO ŠEBREK – AFIAP, ESFIAP wrote about photography:
REALITY AND ILLUSION IN THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF EVA LAMROPOULOU
I have the 7th “Pannonia Reflections 2020” international photography exhibition catalog in front of me. Although I have already carefully reviewed the catalog before, I am going through its pages once again, and I am, this time with more passion and understanding, analyzing the published award-winning images, enjoying them, and thinking about them and their authors.
I have been following the organization, creation, and results of this important international cultural and artistic event (competition, exhibition, and catalog) for seven years now. I have also participated several times myself, either as a jury member or as an author. I enjoy observing, analyzing, and researching photographs. I am not only paying attention to the images published in the catalog or hanged in the exhibition spaces. Instead, I choose a wider approach, relying on the published photographs as well as the writings of their authors on various online blogs or websites. Sometimes I reach for related professional literature as well.
In photography, I always look for what the image is trying to say – its content, narrative, message, and how it affects the perception of the observer.
Eva Lamropoulou, a Greek photographer, thinks and creates with a similar mindset to mine. She was awarded the FIAP Gold Medal for her image titled »SUMMER IS OVER« in the theme »Water«. Members of the jury declared her photograph the best among 1.139 received images in this theme.
We know that a photograph is by its very nature either a document, a proof of reality, or a photographic image, created by the expressive means of the photographer. As a document, it presents (mirrors) reality as it is. It is an authentic reflection of the world. However, as a means of expression, a photographic image then, it mirrors some other reality – an illusion, a metaphor, fiction, fantasy, or abstraction.
Eva Lambropoulou’s award-winning photograph, by its nature and character, belongs to the realm of photographic images. It is a »mirror, reflecting the artist’s portrait, and a window through which we can better see and understand the world around us« (John Szarkovski, American photographer, curator, and writer).
The awarded photograph encouraged me to look at all the author’s images posted on various internet portals and websites and to read all the articles dealing with her work. Deducing from the presented opus of her work, we can see her understanding of life and art as two inseparable dimensions. With her creative expression, various procedures in production and post-production, she penetrates the surface of reality and transposes it into another reality – into the world of art.
Also, Eva told us a few words about herself:
My name is Eva Lambropoulou and I am a doctor by profession, with expertise in Surgical Pathology and director of the Surgical Pathology Department of the General Hospital of Messolonghi, Greece.
From an early age, I had an artistic aptitude that firstly expressed in painting. I love black and white and I have participated in many international painting competitions. I have been painting until I began my studies at the Medical School of the University of Patras. My involvement with photography since then was rather sporadic and I have been concerned only with just shooting as a professional photographer processed the film. For the last seven years, and with the use of digital photo editing software, this occupation has become almost daily. My interest is mainly focused on portrait photography as well as on-street, still life, and nude photography. On March the 7th of 2020, I had my first personal photographic exhibition at Athens FIAP Exhibition Centre.
What is a photograph for me? Many people consider that photography simply captures the reality. According to my opinion, this is absolutely wrong. Garry Winogrand has said: “A photograph is the illusion of a literal description of how the camera ‘saw’ a piece of time and space.” That is what inspires me most: the transformation of the reality with the placement of the volumes, with the dialogue of the substrates, with the metaphorical power of the image.
In the gallery below you can see more of Eva’s photos:
