Ion Zupcu Final Report
Personal Background: Ion Zupcu is a Romanian minimalist photographer born in 1960. In the early eighties he studied photography in Bucharest Romania and during the time he got married and had a daughter. As a result of spending more time at home with his daughter, Zupcu took up still life photography as a way to continue his passion. During 1991, Zupcu decided to move to New York City to start a new life for himself. During his time as cabbie, Zupcu met an owner of a black and white printing lab who went on to hire him, reinstating his love for photography. During his time working for the darkroom lab, he learned about the great American photographers such as Ansel Adams who pushed his interests towards landscape photography. Seven years after his arrival to America, his wife and daughter were granted permission to join him in New York, which again pushed his photography focus back to still life images. As of today, Zupcu has spent over 20 years mastering his field of still life photography and has produced 10 total albums of photos ranging from eggs to bottles to small strips of paper. His work has been featured in many private collections along with exhibits in the Detroit Institute of Art, and The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston.
Style: The majority of Ion’s work are minimalistic still life images. In his early works his images consisted of a single subject such as bottles or flowers usually with great detail, though a simple concept. As time went on, his images switched from detailed subjects to more simple ones consisting of strong dynamic lines for the viewer’s eyes to follow. These sets of images range from small, all white mock-ups of American homes to strips of curled and folded paper. Shadows also play a great role in Zupcu’s work as most of his subjects include one or two colors leading to most of the contrast in the images being in the shadows. On top of this, up until 2012, all of Zupcu’s images were taken in black and white again leading to the central point of contrast to be in the shadows.
Philosophy: While all of Zupcu’s work displays simple objects in stunning and eye-catching ways, this isn’t the only aspect that fascinates him about photography. Rather, his photos serve as a marker in time, or an entry of what he did in his life. For Ion, his photos are able to bring back memories of more than just the photo. They are able to tell him who he was, what he was doing and how he felt at the time the photo was taken. For Zupcu, his photos are more than just memories, they’re part of his identity.
Influences: My favorite photos I’ve ever taken are almost all landscape images. For me there’s something fascinating about taking as much detail as possible in a large landscape and squeezing all that detail down into a single photo. That’s not what Zupcu’s work is about. Rather than trying to capture a great scale with an overwhelming amount of detail, Zupcu’s images are simple and easy to look at. They consist of simple shapes and lines that are easy to follow and understand. While I will never stop taking photos of vast landscapes, Zupcu’s work has inspired me to look at nature more closely and take more photos of simple subjects, and not just the big picture.