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About the PhotographerBorn in Moscow, Diana Markosian takes an intimate approach to her photography and video storytelling, in work that is both conceptual and documentary. Her projects have taken her to some of the most remote corners of the world, and have been featured in National Geographic Magazine, The New Yorker, and Vanity Fair. She holds a Masters of Science degree from Columbia University in New York. Her debut monograph, Santa Barbara, was published by Aperture in 2020, and an exhibition by the same name at the International Center of Photography is on view September 24, 2021–January 10, 2022. Santa Barbara recreates the story of Markosian’s family’s journey from post-Soviet Russia to the U.S. in the 1990s. |
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Truth in Photography: Complete the sentence, truth and photography is–
Diana Markosian: The first thing that comes to mind is fiction. I'm learning that the more I make images, the less truthful they are, and the more I impose my own version of what truth is. I think there's been something very liberating about understanding that version of truth, because it really doesn't become black and white. There's that middle area that I've been really fascinated by, in my own practice.
TiP: Your book Santa Barbara is really evocative in so many different ways, and I'm particularly interested in how your work is connected to the idea of the family album. Could you talk a little bit about that?
Markosian: I think it's fragments of a family album. I think there's this idea of not really understanding what a family looks like, and trying as an adult to piece it together. Art has become my crutch. I think photography has helped me feel included in this world. Santa Barbara became an extension of that.
Diana Markosian: The first thing that comes to mind is fiction. I'm learning that the more I make images, the less truthful they are, and the more I impose my own version of what truth is. I think there's been something very liberating about understanding that version of truth, because it really doesn't become black and white. There's that middle area that I've been really fascinated by, in my own practice.
TiP: Your book Santa Barbara is really evocative in so many different ways, and I'm particularly interested in how your work is connected to the idea of the family album. Could you talk a little bit about that?
Markosian: I think it's fragments of a family album. I think there's this idea of not really understanding what a family looks like, and trying as an adult to piece it together. Art has become my crutch. I think photography has helped me feel included in this world. Santa Barbara became an extension of that.
TiP: Talk a little bit more about that, how photography helps you to feel included in the world. Because in some sense, photographers are outside what they're photographing.
Markosian: Photography has allowed me to feel at home with myself, and with the people around me. It's given me an anchor, in a way that my upbringing couldn't. My parents are both Armenian, and I was brought up with a sort of expectation of what family should be. My family never lived up to this. Life got in the way. The country collapsed. My parents' marriage dissolved. And the rest followed. Desperation. That's ultimately what led my Mom to America. One decision that changed everyone's life forever. I've spent so many years trying to process this, and I am sure I'll spend the rest of my life, in one way or another, reflecting on it.
TiP: How did your presence as a photographer with your own family change your interactions with them?
Markosian: There's always been this feeling in me that I'm not going to get this right alone, so I tried to involve my family in re-telling our story. The first project I made about my father, my entire family was against me finding him, they were against me actually pursuing a project about it. It just felt like it was me versus everyone else. It was essentially the darkest secret we had in our family: Who was my father? I think each of these projects has brought my family closer together. It's not overnight, but it has helped us heal, in one way or another.
TiP: What is family to you?
Markosian: Family is complicated. It's both a privilege and a choice we make.
Markosian: Photography has allowed me to feel at home with myself, and with the people around me. It's given me an anchor, in a way that my upbringing couldn't. My parents are both Armenian, and I was brought up with a sort of expectation of what family should be. My family never lived up to this. Life got in the way. The country collapsed. My parents' marriage dissolved. And the rest followed. Desperation. That's ultimately what led my Mom to America. One decision that changed everyone's life forever. I've spent so many years trying to process this, and I am sure I'll spend the rest of my life, in one way or another, reflecting on it.
TiP: How did your presence as a photographer with your own family change your interactions with them?
Markosian: There's always been this feeling in me that I'm not going to get this right alone, so I tried to involve my family in re-telling our story. The first project I made about my father, my entire family was against me finding him, they were against me actually pursuing a project about it. It just felt like it was me versus everyone else. It was essentially the darkest secret we had in our family: Who was my father? I think each of these projects has brought my family closer together. It's not overnight, but it has helped us heal, in one way or another.
TiP: What is family to you?
Markosian: Family is complicated. It's both a privilege and a choice we make.
TiP: How does photography convey that? That feeling of choice. You think about family albums, and the nature of the snapshot, and you think about your work, which in some ways echoes that, but is more intentional, or intentional in a different way than the family snapshot. What's the difference? And how does that work itself out in your images?
Markosian: When I think about family snapshots, I think about something that exists on the surface. For instance, we have beautiful Super 8 footage, hours of it. Whenever I watch them with my Mom, she cringes. For her, it represents a small part of the truth. Once the camera was turned off, reality sets in, and it's unlike anything in those videos. In a way, photography has the ability to really deepen bonds and relationships, but I also think that it can be misleading, because you can have these beautiful fragments, these beautiful moments, that really don't reveal very much of the truth. In a way, we see the same reality with Instagram and social media. It's a curated version of our reality.
Markosian: When I think about family snapshots, I think about something that exists on the surface. For instance, we have beautiful Super 8 footage, hours of it. Whenever I watch them with my Mom, she cringes. For her, it represents a small part of the truth. Once the camera was turned off, reality sets in, and it's unlike anything in those videos. In a way, photography has the ability to really deepen bonds and relationships, but I also think that it can be misleading, because you can have these beautiful fragments, these beautiful moments, that really don't reveal very much of the truth. In a way, we see the same reality with Instagram and social media. It's a curated version of our reality.
TiP: So, in terms of your photography, and the images that you make, how do you express that complexity? It seems it's there, there's something about your photographs and the way they're lit, the way in which you compose them, the framing, that suggests that there's something on the edge of dystopia there.
Markosian: Projects come to you when you need them. You can't really replicate that voice that allows you to make those images, at that time. When I look at the images I made of my father in 2012, 2013, I can't imagine making those images today. It feels like another person created that work. I think that's a good thing. That shows to me that I'm growing, and that I'm becoming a different version of myself. My relationship with my father was different, I'm very close to him now. The writing there, I couldn't even imagine writing those words now.
TiP: Talk a little bit about that relationship in terms of your process, and making photographs and writing. Which comes first?
Markosian: I am not sure if one comes before the other. I often have an idea, and sit with it for a year or two before really diving in. Most of my ideas don't pan out. They're dead ends. When something does align, there's a sudden urgency to it, it feels almost a disservice to prolong it. I guess a part of me knows that it's rare, and fleeting, and I have to really seize the idea, because it's not forever.
Markosian: Projects come to you when you need them. You can't really replicate that voice that allows you to make those images, at that time. When I look at the images I made of my father in 2012, 2013, I can't imagine making those images today. It feels like another person created that work. I think that's a good thing. That shows to me that I'm growing, and that I'm becoming a different version of myself. My relationship with my father was different, I'm very close to him now. The writing there, I couldn't even imagine writing those words now.
TiP: Talk a little bit about that relationship in terms of your process, and making photographs and writing. Which comes first?
Markosian: I am not sure if one comes before the other. I often have an idea, and sit with it for a year or two before really diving in. Most of my ideas don't pan out. They're dead ends. When something does align, there's a sudden urgency to it, it feels almost a disservice to prolong it. I guess a part of me knows that it's rare, and fleeting, and I have to really seize the idea, because it's not forever.
TiP: How do your photographs of family differ from other photographs that you make?
Markosian: I don't know if I want to separate the two. I want to think that I approach every project with the same amount of respect, and the same amount of thoughtfulness. And that feels really important. I think I naturally have more time with my family, because we're building this together. We're creating in a way that feels so pure. There's no real brief, it's something else. It's personal, and it's ours.
TiP: How do you feel you express a sense of place in your work? And what characteristics of that place are you trying to convey? Or is it driven by the people, and wherever they are, that's the place?
Markosian: I think place is one of the most important parts of my photography, personally, because so much of it has been elsewhere. I’m immersing myself in that place to feel as though I belong there, and I've lived there for ages. I think you just want to feel embedded, as though you have a voice in this location, you have a voice in this image. To me, there's this feeling of comfort that needs to exist for me to be able to produce.
Markosian: I don't know if I want to separate the two. I want to think that I approach every project with the same amount of respect, and the same amount of thoughtfulness. And that feels really important. I think I naturally have more time with my family, because we're building this together. We're creating in a way that feels so pure. There's no real brief, it's something else. It's personal, and it's ours.
TiP: How do you feel you express a sense of place in your work? And what characteristics of that place are you trying to convey? Or is it driven by the people, and wherever they are, that's the place?
Markosian: I think place is one of the most important parts of my photography, personally, because so much of it has been elsewhere. I’m immersing myself in that place to feel as though I belong there, and I've lived there for ages. I think you just want to feel embedded, as though you have a voice in this location, you have a voice in this image. To me, there's this feeling of comfort that needs to exist for me to be able to produce.
TiP: Where do you see your work going now?
Markosian: It needs to build, it needs to be even more complicated than Santa Barbara is. I want to continue with my personal work. I have a new project that I'm working on, and I hope it's deeper and more nuanced than Santa Barbara. I am also exploring commissions. I want to shoot bigger campaigns, I want to do covers -- and really feel like I push my own creativity and style. That's ultimately what excites me about photography -- the growth.
TiP: So what did you set out to become?
Markosian: Up until I was 16, I was a dancer and I thought I would become professional. Then I had an injury that changed the course of my career. I went to university, studied history, and then studied writing in graduate school. I thought I would be a writer. My master's was in writing, and I think it was there where I just understood I had no talent in it, and that I needed to find a new profession. I was 21. There was always this interest in seeing the world. I grew up feeling so isolated in Santa Barbara, and there was just this feeling of everything I was reading about I wanted to see, and how could I do that? How could I make that happen for myself?
TiP: We know as artists, that you have to keep pushing forward, you have to keep being willing to take the risk to reinvent yourself.
Markosian: That's the most exciting part of art. There's so much space to define what it all means to you. The biggest fear for me is repeating myself. That's something I am really aware of, and often wonder how to avoid. To continue to be true to my practice, however slow it may be. It just needs to feel authentic.
Markosian: It needs to build, it needs to be even more complicated than Santa Barbara is. I want to continue with my personal work. I have a new project that I'm working on, and I hope it's deeper and more nuanced than Santa Barbara. I am also exploring commissions. I want to shoot bigger campaigns, I want to do covers -- and really feel like I push my own creativity and style. That's ultimately what excites me about photography -- the growth.
TiP: So what did you set out to become?
Markosian: Up until I was 16, I was a dancer and I thought I would become professional. Then I had an injury that changed the course of my career. I went to university, studied history, and then studied writing in graduate school. I thought I would be a writer. My master's was in writing, and I think it was there where I just understood I had no talent in it, and that I needed to find a new profession. I was 21. There was always this interest in seeing the world. I grew up feeling so isolated in Santa Barbara, and there was just this feeling of everything I was reading about I wanted to see, and how could I do that? How could I make that happen for myself?
TiP: We know as artists, that you have to keep pushing forward, you have to keep being willing to take the risk to reinvent yourself.
Markosian: That's the most exciting part of art. There's so much space to define what it all means to you. The biggest fear for me is repeating myself. That's something I am really aware of, and often wonder how to avoid. To continue to be true to my practice, however slow it may be. It just needs to feel authentic.