Stacii Samidin
SOCIETIES
“Be open and honest
as a human being and
an artist. fight, fight
fight!!!
Oh yeah, and sleeping
is a real waste of time!”
South-America
Stacii Samidin was born and raised
in Rotterdam and graduated from
Willem de Kooning Academy in
2014. The thing he loves the most
is to take photographs of people
and their identities. He likes to
brutally confront you with these
images by erasing stereotypes and
making you see another side of
life. These images aren’t framed
in 10x15 frameworks, we’re
talking life-size photographs
which will suck you in and make
you feel as if you were actually
there. So there’s no need to take
a magnifying glass in your back
pocket. The images need to speak
for themselves and every human
aspect needs to be visible. He
wants to show us that at the end
of the day, the only thing that
separates us from being different
is culture and nationality.
“Image is the only language I do speak, and
when I do, the unconscious will be set down”
>You portray the people you photograph in their
natural habitat, surrounded by family as well, do
you notice anything different about the children
from the men of these gangs?
>How did you experience your time in Willem de
Kooning, did you already approach photography in
the same way as you do now ?
I was never like the students that haunted for good
grades. I preferred doing my own thing and I still
do. You need to live, and stay true to yourself, that’s
when you make your best art. It’s been 8 years since
I started portraying the ‘Societies’ series. I didn’t
limit myself by staying in the Netherlands, I’ve been
traveling all over the world. In school I frequently
got critique from my teachers. Even outside the
walls of the academy not everyone understands the
story you want to tell. If this is the case you should
be selfish and just do whatever you think will get you
further in life, go for it a 100%
The children seem to mature faster than they do
here, but I don’t judge, at all. Not everyone is raised
with the same values and principles: in Rotterdam
“normal” will mean something totally different
than in (for example) Los Angeles. Soon I will
head to Nairobi to photograph citizens of a rough
neighborhood. I think the core values from that
society will again be entirely different from the last.
Not everyone thinks the same as you do, so you just
have to adapt to the situation.
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