Kopin Katalin (szerk.): Test objektív. A test reprezentációja a kortárs művészetben - Ferenczy Múzeum kiadványai, C. sorozat: Katalógusok 5. (Szentendre, 2013)

In her 1998 photo series entitled Sunbathers, Lilla Szász inserted an image of a vanishing piece of the Russian past into the time frames of the present. The bathing and sunbathing men and women, who seem to be almost anachronistic figures, are performing their unusual ritual within the stone walls of the Peter and Paul Fortress on the bank of the Neva: after diving into the river among drifts of ice, they are drying themselves by enjoying the sunshine, and warming themselves by leaning on rocks. Undisturbed by unwanted lookers-on, they create a perfectly intimate, private atmosphere in the open and public urban space. Instead of looking like isolated, lonely and wandering homeless people in a big city, they make up an almost contemplative, cheerfully relaxed group whose nakedness is rather natural than embarrassing. Instead of seeming to be people in need on the periphery, they appear to be happy and carefree outlaws.

The photos evoking Henri Cartier-Bresson’s imagery and legacy are great examples for grasping ’decisive moments’. Cartier-Bresson visited the Soviet Union in 1973. His photo Peter and Paul’s Fortress on the Neva River was taken during this trip. The photograph shows the grotesque figure of a man sunbathing alone next to walking figures.

Lilla Szász met this strange company while she was in Saint Petersburg with scholarship. After visiting them day by day, she became their confidant. The photos are not mere snapshots of the moment, but attempt to portray the Russian mind and soul. Her photos make the spectator part of this narrative series of events, as well. Looking for literary parallelisms, we could mention the novels by Lyudmila Ulitskaya, in which the writer shows the real profile of Russian society and its intellectual characteristics rooted in the past vividly.