Romualdas Sakalauskas: “I see myself as a “mushroomer”
Good day. Do you dream?
I don’t. It saddens me a bit, but I see it as some kind of self-defence of my organism.
What does it mean to kick barefoot into the blind sky three times?
This phrase doesn‘t ring a bell. Maybe it‘s a struggle for justice of some lithuanian folk tale character against Gods.
Your work doesn’t have a concept, you like Carlos Castaneda and Quentin Tarantino. These things all look so unrelated…
As A. Poletajeva said, there are two types of photographers – the ones who work with some scenarios and the “mushroomers”, the ones who collect special moments with no preparation. It’s like movies and documentaries in cinematography. I see myself as a mushroomer, but it doesn‘t mean that there won‘t be any work in different style later. Spare time and all other factors mean a lot here… I‘d like to try computer graphics, I‘d like to create something in the vain of Salvador Dalí. But it requires time, I don‘t want to share my scrap papers, instead I like to display something which is not an amusement for the eye only, but can be improved more and more. Castaneda and Tarantino have a lot in common. They both can see essentiality, they both see environment ironically and both create things that captivate me. They both reveal something we all have inside. But we are afraid to accept that we have it or we are trying to protect ourselves from that knowledge. Moreover, while evoking wievers‘ or readers‘subconsciousness and releasing their imagination, they both use nothing else but creation. By the way, I guess everyone knows Sigmund Freud as a deviser of psychoanalysis, who explains everything through a prism of sex, which is a main element of pleasure. In his later works Freud accepted this view was a mistake and straightened: „The main element is creative work“. Talking about poetry, Castaneda values its‘ capacity to create moods, show authors‘ feelings as if there‘s some secret emotion or information encoded in it. I think photography can be perceived similarly. Some photographs sound, affect, and some are passed by unnoticed.
Characterize yourself as a person, as a photographer, as a passerby, as a friend.
When I work – I work, when I‘m lazing around – I‘m lazing around. I appreciate the freedom of choice. I hate violence. I want to learn, try, experience everything. Probably I am a fatalist dreamer, who has enough imagination to excuse his laziness, who tries to attain success without any bigger endeavour. Photography for me was a hobby for a decade. Later, for about five years, it was a job. After that followed a crysis and I realised I couldn‘t achieve a high quality result with soviet photochemistry, so I gave up. It was a time when everyone wanted colour photographs, and I didn‘t want to produce waste. Once I told, that the things that 20-25 years ago were considered as a waste (twisted colours, stains or dust on the negative, dimness, messy framing) nowadays are represented as avant-garde. I want to be tolerant, reliable and i want to „be“, not „look like“.
Lithuanian village. What is it?
A living organism. After the fall of kolkhozes the „village“ split up into farm-labourers and farmers. I think the era of alcoholism has come to an end. Communities emerge, there‘s a self-expression demand. The only bad thing – unstoppable aging process. Youth in cities, old people rest on their crooked houses waiting for grandchildren to come. While culture is a political object, it won‘t come back to the village. I don‘t think we will get money for it any time soon. It means everything depends on the village devotees – eccentrics. Those for whom money and wages aren‘t the most important thing. They can get satisfaction in other ways. They „improve“ too. They watch mexican soap-operas, eat hot-dogs and drink Coca-Cola. Of course, there always are nuggets. Sad but true – rarely.
You know, that our project is dedicated to the presentation of Lithuanian photographers to foreign photography lovers. Maybe there is something you‘d like to tell them? And maybe describe Lithuanian photography in a few words?
I think my speculations should be seen as thoughts of one single person, and not some generalising conception.
We can‘t talk about present without mentioning the past. 20 years ago world-class artists (Macijauskas, Sutkus, Rakauskas, Butyrinas, Požerskis, Dichavičius, Šonta, etc.) emerged in Lithuania. In soviet times they were able to convey non-soviet mood and arouse thoughts. It was the era of black and white photography in Lithuania. With minimal implements, with no colour (simply there were no colour photochemistry) they had to learn to show everyone what the world has forgotten.
Today we‘re on the other side and we are the ones who are chasing the world which is running so fast with it‘s new technologies and colours. We do their mistakes and try to find how we could be interesting for the world. Here we see that the old Lithuanian photography hasn‘t left it‘s positions. To be able to contain or convey thoughts through photography – it‘s the only way not to sink in the sea of soulless postcards. That’s where non-commercial Fotokudra comes in.
Fotokudra.lt. Why? Why not flickr or any other community?
I guess it depends on your needs. I was on Images.lt, but when the website gets commercial, the people get too, all their work get this „commercial stamp“ too – illustrations for advertisements are wanted, not authors‘ self-expression. I was feeling like a stranger there, although there were some works I sold. Fotokudra.lt satisfies my needs, so I don‘t really want to waste my time and seek for something better. For some time it kind of sucked me in, but when I felt, that I‘m not in control, I left for a half-year. Now I came back and I‘m trying to keep my independence. It‘s quite a mature, democratic community, there are people from whom I could learn and people whom I could teach something. A balance of different style and level photographers impacts a variety of styles, kinds and trends. It all satisfies me, and the word „better“ is a enemy to the word „good“.
Your comments on this website are often intriguing and „revolutionary“. We‘ve even heard Fotokudras‘ members calling you revolutionist. Do you have this kind of intentions? Would you like to alter or reform something?
Absolutely no. I don‘t want my comments to be considered revolutionary, and if they are, it‘s my fault. I‘d like to be Evolutionist, not Revolutionist. For me revolution is re evolution. I choose a consisten process of perfection against a process where something new is built on old remains. There‘s always a need for perfection, but normally it gets quite challenging, because you have no idea where you‘re going. In this case, we are walking blindfold on a road of attempts, experiments and mistakes.
We know you like C. Castaneda. If you remember, he knows how to ask questions.
„I followed their appearances and disappearances in the mirror for a long time. At one point it occurred to me that the car was gaining on us. It was definitely closing in. The lights were bigger and brighter. I deliberately stepped on the gas pedal. I had a sensation of uneasiness. Don Juan seemed to notice my concern, or perhaps he was only noticing that I was speeding up. He looked at me first, then he turned around and looked at the distant headlights.
He asked me if there was something wrong with me. I told him that I had not seen any cars behind us for hours and that suddenly I had noticed the lights of a car that seemed to be gaining on us all the time.
He chuckled and asked me if I really thought it was a car. I told him that it had to be a car and he said that my concern revealed to him that, somehow, I must have felt that whatever was behind us was something more than a mere car. I insisted that I thought it was just another car on the highway, or perhaps a truck.
“What else can it be?” I said loudly.“
We all have intuition. Human being is a perfect life-form and the potentials of its‘ mind are unique. We hold a lot good memories in our heads, and we don‘t usually remember what was unpleasant.
The idea of Guardian Angel is quite an acceptable thing. But the idea of carrying Death on the left shoulder is intimidating. It‘s our subconscious which protects us from wicked thoughts about our life, about the frailty of our entity. But Castaneda is a surgeon – he prepares our minds exhibiting things from which people are trying to protect themselves – from knowing. As Castaneda wrote in one of his books, the more we know, the more lonely we feel.
“You talk to yourself too much. You’re not unique at that. Every one of us does that. We carry on an internal talk. Think about it. Whenever you are alone, what do you do?”
Unfortunately I don‘t know. The line between me and Castaneda I guess is still very thick. I try to feel, sometimes I try to find an explanation why is it so. I try to accept senses and feelings that come to me and I am happy of This moment, because it is here and now. There is no tomorrow. Tomorrow will be tomorrows‘ today, an so on. So if I learn how to enjoy This moment, I‘ll be happy. It‘s the same thing that Buddhas followers would tell you.
The more you wish, the more nonfulfilled wishes there are, the more unhappy you are. If you learn to appreciate what you have, maybe you can find your own happiness in yourself?
“Tonight you’ll venture into those unknown hills. In the darkness they are not hills.”
“What are they?”
Some wise man once told, that courage is a lack of imagination. Castanedas‘ reality outruns our imagination, and in his world there is nothing real or unreal. It‘s the world where both ends of the road are familiar – one end to the energy of matter, and the other to the matter of energy. And Castaneda is showing us how to control these processes, he is teaching us how to see, not only look. And nowaday science knows only one and single way – let‘s burn wood, and we‘ll get thermal and light energy. But if modern physics doesn‘t know how to transform the energy into matter (what Sai Baba is believed to be doing), it still doesn‘t mean, that it can not be? Right?
