ATELO- is an inspiring conceptual fashion photography project created by one of the talented students of the University of South Wales. The photographer and director of this project is Georgios Loucaides. Georgios aspiration was to produce and include nine dissimilar photographs, which depict metaphorically and conceptually every symptom that he has faced due to his personal insecurities, of not being good enough in every aspect of his life. ATELO-, is showing these nine symptoms with an alternative, innovative, fashion inspired way.

 

Georgios is talking about his project, inspirations and future plans in an interview with PLATFFORM.

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What was your inspiration behind the Atelo- project?

 

Atelo- is based on my suffering from a mental instability which have haunted my life from a young age. The project focus on making visible and bringing to the surface the largely invisible subject of insecurities and fear of being imperfect. My main inspirations for that project were painters that suffered from mental instabilities and they expressed their inner chaotic world through their artworks. Artists like Edvard Munch, Vincent Van Gogh, Jackson Pollock, Jean Michael Basquiat and Frida Kahlo.

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How does the name ATELO- describe your project? Is there a meaning behind the name?

 

Atelo- is a prefix word, with Greek origins, which indicates the meaning of imperfect or incomplete. Prefix is a word, letter, or number placed before another word to create a new one. From my point of view, Atelo- was the best word to describe my fear and concern of imperfection which is always in front of anything I am doing in my life.

 

How did you involve fashion into your work?

 

Many people will disagree about the fact that my project is fashion based. There are many platforms and ways to use fashion within art that people can not understand. My work includes fashion elements through the usage of models, clothing, posing and lighting.

 

What challenges have you faced during this process?

 

My main challenge was the subject matter of the project itself as I am depicting and reaching a venerable and complex level of self-fragmentation and uncontrollable agony, which many people, including myself, have been through.

 

Which is your favourite photo of this collection and why?

 

Personally, I can not tell that I have a favorite photo from the project as all of them are completely different to each other, including different elements, lightings, clothes, and models.

 

I see the red color is the main color of your project. Is there a specific meaning behind it?

 

I was extremely inspired by Franz Marc and Frida Kahlo, who both were using color theory in their paintings to reflect emotions and feelings through them. My photographs are linked between them through an aesthetical usage of color pallets, embracing a symbolic color theory, aiming to express ideas and emotions. Including shades of black to white, being the colors that best describe moods and feelings of people who are mentally unstable. The usage of the color red indicates the urge for strength, confidence, motivation, and courage.

 

Have any fashion photographers influenced you during the making of this series? And how?

 

A new photographer called Steph Wilson had a massive impact on my work.  She suffers from anxiety and she tried to show that through her project called” The Bell Curve” with magazine Dazed and Confused. The photoshoot serves both memorial of that time and effort to explain anxiety to non-suffers.

Visually I was influenced by my three favorite fashion photographers Nick Knight, Steven Klein and Tim Walker. They are completely different aesthetically to each other but I was using elements from all three of them.

 

What are your future plans or projects after getting your BA photography degree this year?

 

The following September I am moving to London for Masters as I was accepted to University of the Arts London for MA in Fashion Photography. The same time I will try to get a job as an assistant photographer to gain the right knowledge and experience I will need to face the industry. And for sure, I will keep shooting and creating new projects and ideas, push myself and creativity.