BIOGRAPHY

Born in New Britain, CT, USA

New York University - Tisch School of the Arts (2008) - BFA in Film & Television Production | Honors Scholar Graduate | Summa Cum Laude

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In December of 1981, my parents embarked on a harrowing journey, narrowly escaping the tightening grip of martial law and the escalating political repression in their ancestral homeland, Wrocław (formerly Breslau), Poland. With only a single small suitcase and $400, they fled to the United States, seeking refuge from the political turmoil of their homeland. After crisscrossing several countries, they finally found sanctuary in New Britain, Connecticut, a city renowned for its burgeoning Polish-German émigré community. Known as the “Hardware City,” New Britain stood as one of North America's largest manufacturing centers, offering promise and opportunity to newcomers like my parents.

Born in New Britain, my childhood unfolded amidst the backdrop of blue-collar life within a predominantly European immigrant community. Early on, I would sometimes accompany my parents to their respective workplaces. Whether shadowing my mom or dad on their shifts, I routinely found myself amidst imposing warehouses, dreary industrial parks, and stark office buildings, their hushed halls devoid of activity during twilight hours. These excursions became an integral part of my upbringing and sparked my interest in prosaic landscapes. As I matured and ventured beyond the confines of my hometown, I encountered similar vistas scattered across the country, each bearing a striking resemblance to the places I once explored as a child. Only later in life did I fully comprehend the profound influence these familiar sights would exert on my evolution as a visual artist.

Fueled by a deep-seated love for visual arts and music, my journey as an artist began at a young age. Though I didn't initially excel in the visual arts, I pursued them fervently, studying the works of great artists while exploring art theory and composition. This foundation eventually led me to large-format photography and conceptual art, which became my primary means of expression. As a teenager, I also immersed myself in music (specifically piano performance and music composition), dedicating countless hours each day to practicing everything from the intricate fugues of J.S. Bach to the avant-garde works of Scriabin, Prokofiev, and Schoenberg. Like photographer-pianists William Eggleston and Ansel Adams, I found the relationship between photography and music too intriguing to ignore: one medium freezes time, while the other cannot exist without it. In an oblique way, each fills in the other's gaps. Although I still play the piano obsessively, I realized a career as a performer was impossible due to persistent stage fright.

In high school, encouraged by well-received film projects, I gravitated toward narrative filmmaking, which I saw as the ideal medium to combine my artistic aspirations. At NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, I studied screenwriting, directing, cinematography, and editing. After graduating, I moved to Los Angeles with dreams of a filmmaking career.

After several years working as a screenplay reader/editor and movie trailer copywriter, I realized Hollywood was not for me. Fortunately, I landed a job as a studio manager to a well-known celebrity portrait and fine art photographer, Matthew Rolston. His office was filled with art monographs, which I gleefully devoured during my downtime. As my understanding of the medium deepened, I rediscovered still photography as a preferable format for expressing ideas. It offered greater control and independence, requiring little more than a camera, a good concept, and occasional help from family, friends, or actors.

Currently based in Southern California and the Tri-State area (New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey), I focus on documenting the ever-changing landscapes of industry, labor, leisure, and the exponential progress of technology and its precarious relationship to nature. Primarily using large- and medium-format film cameras, my work is deeply rooted in the alien topography of my youth, scenes that continue to challenge and inspire me. Though some of my photographs are “straight,” most of my works are carefully-composed composites. As nothing I photograph can be a true facsimile of memory, tools like Photoshop allow me to compose images according to my mind’s eye. Still, my works encourage varied interpretations, a flexibility that makes photography such a remarkable medium.

Photography is one of the few deductive arts. Practically every art medium begins with a tabula rasa - a blank canvas or a quiet stage awaiting dancers. Photography begins with a world already inundated with content; a photographic artist must choose what to include and what to exclude within a limited frame.

I owe an enormous debt to a wide range of photographers, painters, and visual artists who have influenced me, including Jeff Wall, Todd Hido, Bernd and Hilla Becher (and their students: Andreas Gursky, Thomas Struth, Candida Höfer, Thomas Ruff, Jörg Sasse, Axel Hütte, Elger Esser), Gregory Crewdson, Lewis Baltz, Victoria Sambunaris, Paul Graham, Larry Sultan, Christopher Williams, Simon Roberts, Collier Schorr, Curran Hatleberg, Ilona Szwarc, Jason Fulford, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Catherine Opie, Evelyn Hofer, Rinko Kawauchi, Alec Soth, Gregory Halpern, Thomas Demand, Edward Burtynsky, Joel Sternfeld, Joel Meyerowitz, Stephen Shore, Robert Adams, Frank Gohlke, Martin Schoeller, Olivo Barbieri, John Chiara, William Eggleston, Richard Misrach, Mitch Epstein, Diane Arbus, Bruce Davidson, Albert Renger-Patzsch, Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Edward Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, August Sander, Paul Strand, Saul Leiter, Walker Evans, Uta Barth, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Justine Kurland, Hannah Starkey, Nadav Kander, John Humble, Helmut Newton, Herb Ritts, Matthew Rolston, Slim Aarons, Guy Bourdin, Franco Fontana, Mark Rothko, Josef Albers, Caspar David Friedrich, Giorgio de Chirico, Barnett Newman, Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline, Ed Ruscha, Yayoi Kusama, Julie Mehretu, Joan Mitchell, James Turrell, Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, Alberto Giacometti, and Francis Bacon, among many others.