Israeli photographers Anna Hayat and Slava Pirsky craft their art using large-format black-and-white Polaroid photographs, taken within the studio and outside of it.

These works explore trauma, self-sacrifice, and the fragility of life. Through their lens, they explore facets of Israeli society intertwined with existential challenges, born out of omnipresence of war and terror. People, landscapes, flora, and objects all find their place in their compositions. Departing from strict documentary representation, the artists construct metaphorical imagery that resonates with current events.

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Anna Hayat and Slava Pirsky have been working together since 1999.

Anna was born in Russia, and immigrated to Israel in 1994. She studied photography in The Hadassah Academic College, Jerusalem.

Slava was born in Russia, and immigrated to Israel in 1991. For the last 30 years he works at archeological restoring the appearance of historical buildings and objects based on found remains.

Now both based in Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut, Israel

The works of Anna Hayat and Slava Pirsky are photographed in a large format on Polaroid films, from which are developed a negative and positive momentarily after the shot. The chemicals left on the face of the negative at the end of the development process, leave a map of stains and marks, which changes from one negative to the other. This way, the action of controlled photography clears way for the random stains, which add a picturesque volume to the piece. Although this process damages the crisp quality of the image itself, it preserves the magic of analog photography, and gives back some of the aura that was attached to it when it was first seen.

 

The works of Hayat and Pirsky have won numerous prizes, including the Polaroid International Photography Award, IPA (International Photography Association) Award, Award from the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption, Award for portrait photography from the annual World Press Photo exhibition in Israel.

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