Full Phrases

This is Piotr Niepsuj’s first book of writing. A photographer’s turn toward the writing activity sounds weird, but, in fact, the two disciplines coincide within the realm of documentation, and both expand the relationship between idea, and memory. Without getting too deep into this, in his latest book titled “ Full Phrases”, not a single picture is featured—nor from him, or others. For this project, Niepsuj has worked on editing punchy strings of textual material that he had assembled on his Twitter account for ages, as well as producing new work that reads between rap lyrics and nerdy haikus. “Full Phrases” is an insult to photography, if you might, especially seeing the medium of photography as in critical condition in the viral age. Fundamentally you might question whether today is better to allow people to form images in their head, or just shoot them. Language, after all, allows artists to instill mental images in minds, through a non-visual medium. We won’t go nerd on how much this strategy of signification has been used in Conceptual Art and stuff like that, but trust us, it all makes sense. Flipping through the book, the syncopated rhythm of the layout confronts you with big words presented in a Barbara Krueger-esque gravity: they command to be read. At the end of the day, Niepsuj’s “Full Phrases” is a product of experimentation for the artist himself: the intent is to go beyond the surface of the i mage to decode its myth: language. What is an image without a reader?Text: Federico Sargentone