Klez Brandar: Lusk Dizehan // 5

“Who am I?… In how many words?” He laughs. “My name is Klez and I’m from Brittany, the region of Asterix and Obelix…” he looks up. “Well, kind of…” he smiles. We sit together at Chez Greg by Jiřák. I have a nice glass of Merlot in front of me, while Klez looks sadly at his glass of water. He sniffs and coughs occasionally as the result of the flu epidemic in Prague. “I’ve been living here for almost five years. It’s the fifth country where I’ve lived for a year or more.” I learn that Klez travels a lot. “A friend of mine invited me here to crash on his sofa for a couple of weeks and see how it goes. It was very easy to find a job here. So I tried and I stayed.”

“I Do Photography… Mainly”

“I started to take photos when I was 15 with an analogue camera, and I stopped when digital came, because I didn’t like this quantity feeling, this ‘chk chk chk chk chk’. I said, ‘Okay that’s not for me.’ Which was very stupid, because I could continue in the old way or I could try to make it interesting in the new way… But that’s what I understood after a few years.”

Between 2011-2013, Klez got back into photography, this time to explore the world of digital. “It’s very different from an analogue, so I had to learn. I didn’t take any lessons though.” Klez’s motto is, “Do, do, and do,” he laughs. “That’s the first thing. Then of course, if you have a chance to get formal education go ahead. It’s always good to learn something new, and I think we should keep on studying. But like me, If you don’t have a chance to get formal education, then, ‘Do, do, do.’”

A few years ago Klez started using an analogue camera again. “Back to the film, back to the slow; you think a bit more before you push the button, because it’s expensive, and it limits you to carry around films, especially when you travel. You can’t easily take 300 photos to pick one or two good ones. It requires to know some techniques, but it’s much more straightforward than digital,” Klez sums up the evolution of his weapon of choice.

“What Inspires Me? Everything!”

“I live in Žižkov, which is a neighbourhood with a strong identity. And I connected to that. Wherever you live is a source of inspiration, whether good or bad. And your expression is connected to that. Even if you live in a desert, you might paint a lot of buildings and colourful things, because that’s what you dream of. But,” Klez does a quick reality check, “Prague is not like a desert; it’s a beautiful city, maybe the most beautiful in Europe, with a lot of history and architecture. So my work is influenced by this mix of people, architecture, and then climate, and generally everything around; economy, politics, geography, and so on.”

I dig for Klez’s main source of inspiration. “Everything!” He laughs. “I’m quite curious, I can watch a documentary about wolves in Canada, and after that geopolitics between Israel and Palestine, and then move to just going on the street and observe people and wonder who they are… So it’s a mix of many things; books, music, magazines, talking to people; every kind of people. I’m trying to be open, even though, as we get old, it’s easier to get closed. But I try to keep on being open, at least some days in life.” We share a laugh.

“I Was Charmed By This Place”

Klez’s next photo exhibition is going to open this Saturday at Kino Ponrepo. “The place is connected with the Český Kino Archiv,” – The National Film Archive –  “which is a temple of history, of Czech films. I love kino, but I didn’t know about this place till recently.” Klez tells me he discovered it when he went there for a meeting. “‘Wow, that’s a cool place!’ I said. I immediately asked for a contact of a manager to offer an exhibition there. And they said ‘Yeah, totally.’ So we exchanged some emails, and we agreed on this exhibition. It was very straightforward and easy going…. I’m really happy with the place.” 

“We, independent photographers, or independent musicians, or independent… whatever… We need these places that let us express ourselves. Especially in this technological world where everything is fast, everything is now. I think it’s very important that we have places where we meet, and we don’t need to take a photo of a photo for Instagram, just be together in a moment, and share that moment together,” he explains. “It’s also why I like to do exhibitions; it’s not just about showing my work, but also about making something happen and bringing people together.”

Lusk Dizehan

“The exhibition is a concept of mine which is called Lusk Dizehan.” The name – “Perpetual Movement” in English – is in the Breton language of Klez’s birthplace. “The region of the crepes – palačinky,” Klez adds. This will be the fifth installment in a series of photos taken during his travels. “It’s a selection of 19 pictures which I collected in the past three years, black and white, only from the film. It’s a mix of scenes from the city, architecture and nature. It’s also about the relationship between humans and nature.”

Klez describes where he drew inspiration from for this exhibition, “Every time I drive in the countryside in the Czech Republic I observe that there is nothing that is entirely natural. You will always find… this electric things,” he makes lines from side to side in the air. “You will see a small house there… even in the forest, the trees are far away because humans cut them. So it means that even nature is not natural. Of course not everywhere in the world. But it’s crazy to think that 200 years ago you would have taken a picture of the same place 15 km from Prague, or even in Prague, and it would be natural. Now there is this ‘hand of human’ everywhere.” 

What Makes The Cut?

“I can spend 20 minutes or one hour watching one photo and asking myself, ‘Is it yes, or not?’ Sometimes it’s very hard to make the selection for an exhibition, like, ‘Why the fuck do I consider this picture as a picture that I can show and this one not?’ What is the difference between a really good photo, or artistic photo, and just a random photo like we all take every day with our cell phones?” Klez reveals a bit of his thought process.

“It has to have something more, a story; a message. If it’s just a nice sunshine, it doesn’t do it for me. I’m not a photojournalist, but I need some sort of a story. For example, in the Lusk Dizehan exhibition, there is one photo with two old people with their cell phones there. And they are both on the phones. I like this photo. For me, it represents how I see ourselves in the future, but it’s already now. The future is already now, because I took this photo.” He gives a little teaser of what to expect from the exhibition. 

“It’s Like a Small Party”

Klez paints the picture, “The exhibition will open on the 15th of February at 19:30 at Ponrepo in Bartolomějská. The photos will stay there between a month and a half and two months. One of my Czech friends will play some blues for us that day. People can just come, have a look at the photos, listen to some music, and then go to the kino. It’s nice to bring people together, see some of my friends, meet some new people, and have a glass together. It’s like a small party.”

So here’s our invitation to Lusk Dizehan // 5.

• Check out Klez’s art
• See you at the exhibition opening tomorrow
• Or later at Ponrepo

And for more insight into life in Prague go to this section.