Ewa Monika Zebrowski ~ Montreal, Canada

Sam Abell, photographer: "Ewa Zebrowski's thoughtful photographs are like her elegant books — each one is a refined world within itself. Her work imparts in us a quiet and ineffable desire. We wish to be within the world she photographs."

Anne Michaels, author: "Beauty - not aesthetic pleasure, not the exquisite nor the perfect — is saturated with feeling. Ewa Zebrowski's photographs resemble moving images, for they are less concerned with an arrested moment than with the mystery of time steeping towards a moment. One feels the light changing even as one looks; intensifying, reaching greatest potency, whether toward darkness or radiance. This imbues each image with a profound poignancy, for each photograph is a small story of desire, of a life beyond grasp, lost to us or never found, or at the aching brim of becoming. Desire is a kind of grief, and Ewa Zebrowski's photographs are replete with this desire."

vedute di venezia
Essay by Theodore K. Rabb
Photography by Ewa Zebrowski
2006. Edition of 50.

4.5 x 7.5" in illustrated slipcase. Slipcover image from an engraving by Dionisio Moretti. 27 color images printed on Moab Entrada 190gms. Book and slipcover design by Zebrowski. Graphic design by Francine Savard. Bookbinding by Jacques Fournier.

Theodore K. Rabb’s essay, "The Fragile and the Serene," accompanies Zebrowski's photography.

The opening quotation, which Zebrowski says "reflects the mood of the work so strongly", is a fragment of a conversation between Marco Polo and Kublai Khan from "Invisible Cities" by Italo Calvino.

"Memory's images, once they are fixed in the words, are erased," Polo said. "Perhaps I am afraid of losing Venice all at once, if I speak of it."
$825

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A Circle of Poets

Ewa Zebrowski: "I have created three monographs/books, a series which brings together three poets who have added so much to the literary landscape of the English language. Their work has taken me on a journey of discovery, an extended journey during which I have refined my vision, inspired by their vision and their poetry. Their words have created landscapes for me. Landscapes which I have revisited with my ears and my eyes, landscapes which I have recorded with my camera. "While experiencing the Venetian canali, vicoli and campi, that seduced Joseph Brodsky over his winter breaks, the New England woods, marshes, meadows and streams that were Frost’s domain, and the Maine beaches and shores that for me echoed with the words of Mark Strand’s poetry, I came to a deeper understanding of their poetry. Sensing what might have inspired them made me want to seize/capture images that are a reflection of their inner landscapes.

"My own journey has led me to create books that are tactile, intimate visual experiences for the reader, a parallel journey to their poetic words. The images are small and intimate: black and white for Brodsky and Frost, colour for Strand. Brodsky, Frost, Strand. Their words have served as markers for me, guiding me on my own creative path, an intersection between language and image, discovering their poetry in the landscape."

Another Place
Poem by Mark Strand
Photography by Ewa Zebrowski
Montreal, Canada: Ewa Monika Zebrowski, 2007. Edition of 20.

8.75 x 8.75"; 18 loose, unnumbered pages, laid in a paper-fold case, which is blind embossed with the title. Photography by Ewa Zebrowski: 13 digital inkjet prints printed by an Epson Stylus 1270 printer on Epson Matte Heavyweight paper. Portfolio and Embossing on BFK Rives 250g paper. Housed in lightweight slipcase covered in silver paper.

A collaboration with Pulitzer Prize winning, Wallace Stevens Award winning, and former US Poet Laureate, Mark Strand. His poem, "Another Place" where light is "not enough for blindness / or clear sight / of what is to come" inspire and inform Zebrowski's delicate photographs.

Ewa Zebrowski: "Mark Strand wrote text for my first artist's book inspired by poetry, remembering brodsky, in 2004. Brodsky had been his friend and colleague. A few years passed and I decided I wanted to make a book in his honour, a continuation of the poet's series. It was hard choosing a poem. I find all his poetry moving. For about a year I shot and then edited images which I then showed to Mark. He named his favourites. I listened. His input was valuable for me.

"I finally chose "Another Place" as the poem to include. Mark suggested that we use this as the title for the work itself. We chose the title together and the way the poem appeared at the end. Mark wanted it to be printed very pale as if disappearing."
$800

Poetry in the Landscape: The Robert Frost Trail
Poem by Robert Frost
Photography by Ewa Zebrowski
2006. Edition of 20.

8.5 x 8.5”; 20 leaves. Fifteen numbered inkjet prints laid in letter fold wrapper. 35 mm black-and-white prints scanned and printed on the Epson Stylus 1270 printer onto Epson Matte Heavyweight Paper. Portfolio and embossing on BFK Rives 250g paper. 8.9 x 8.9" paper-covered slipcase. Binding by Jacques Fournier.

Photographs by Zebrowski accompany Frost's "The Road Not Taken."

Zebrowski: "Someone had the idea that his poetry should be placed in the natural habitat about which it was written, thus adding meaning both to the place and to the poetry.

"The walk leads us in a circle through woods, past marsh, stream and
meadows. We stop, pause to read, to reflect, to look at the landscape, to discover the poetry in the landscape."
$800