A Sense of Place (Kosice)
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After twenty-two years, in 2022, I revisited Kosice in Slovakia, the city of my childhood. The series A Sense of Place developed out of a desire to reconnect with the place that I called my home before my family emigrated to the West. Instead of focusing on famous landmarks, I aimed to depict the timeless qualities of postwar residential housing that resonated with my childhood memories.
The vantage point of an outsider who remembers yet does not entirely belong, allowed me to document the vernacular architecture’s formal qualities in a seemingly detached way. In keeping with the idea of revealing the specificity of a place, a pattern of urban fabric emerged, creating a broader link to historical, sociological, and anthropological associations.
I use photography to decode the language of mundane spaces, tracing cultural and historical references through the layers of time. The buildings not only reflect a certain era, its cultural significance, and the specificity of place, further, they also tap into our collective memory, celebrating anonymous architecture and the lives of ordinary people.