Maelstrøm

• Prize
  Gold in Portfolio/Personal
• Photographer
  Attila Ataner
• Technical Info
  Fujifilm Gfx 50s Ii
• Photo Date
  May, 2024

This series of images is a fragmentary narrative woven together from bits and pieces of my dream world. They reflect a kind of conceptual-symbolic documentation of my inner life as I struggle to live with a chronic, often difficult illness combined with aging. I’ve created these images as a way of processing feelings of self-loss, atrophy, fatigue, weakness and insecurity. On the positive side, they try to capture a recognition of life change and offer a statement of hope and an expression of gratitude. But, as they are surrealistic, they are also open to a wide range of interpretations.

I’m a Toronto-based photographer, and a part-time PhD student studying environmental ethics and early-modern German philosophy. My background is Turkish, although my birthplace and first home is in Svishtov, Bulgaria, a small town on the Danube River. I was fortunate enough to receive a comprehensive education in photography at a very young age, while living with my parents as refugee expats in North Africa in the 80s. Lately, I undertake artistic work because, for me, engaging in purposeful creative activity is my only viable route toward finding personally meaningful spiritual fulfilment.