What role do architecture and bodies play in your work? How do you choose the places in your photos?
The range of locations and type of architecture I find suitable for my photography varies in many ways. It can be a grandiose scene with a huge landscape or a very small detail with a clean graphic side to it. I mainly try to find the balance between bodies that can appear small in a big landscape and so I choose the environment I know I can “conquer” as a whole. That will both compliment the body and the environment. Clean lines are important to me, the composition layers can be separated by depth or quite flat but I still look for the clean shapes to pop out. Concrete brutalist architecture is my go-to but nature and abandoned buildings with long history can tell a beautiful story just as well.
Since our current theme is titled HEAVENLY BODIES, how do you perceive the importance of the body within contemporary society and art? How important is the body to you?
I feel it is more and more important to explore new territories, I admit it scares me a bit as I want to be able to represent both the place, my art, and the model in the best way I see fit. Sometimes, I tend to choose the easy way out, so to speak, through people with the ability to move, dance, and express themselves with their body. I feel this has changed in the past couple of years and now I’m working with different types of bodies to describe different environments. That is mainly a sign for me that I have been consistent with my research. I also moved to London more than a year ago, which brought me new opportunities with new talented and amazing people from different communities – something I know will only get wider and bigger the more I will keep on creating there. I find it important for the models to have abilities as I direct in a way that needs to fit the place, it’s not a portrait, we are vassals in a bigger and, hopefully, timeless, story.
BIO / London-based Izraeli photographer and graphic designer Omer Ga’ash graduated from Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem, with a B.A. in visual communication. He is currently studying for his M.A. in Design Expanded Practice at Goldsmiths University of London, focusing on fine art photography. Omer creates patterns from human bodies, addressing them as shapes, and digitally manipulates the elements to form what he calls Nude Texture. Moreover, Gaash creates surrealistic photos by multiplying and adjusting the pictured human model to tell a story of a place and moment in a unique way. Omer danced for almost ten years, competed in Ballroom dancing competitions and some modern styles, giving him an inside understanding of the body and its abilities. He also studied architecture in high school, which also strongly drives his current visual aesthetic.
