From the introduction for the catalogue of the exhibition
“Traces, the Objects and the Past”, Photosynkyria 2003

Viktor Koen leads the viewer to confront the mazes of reality, by creating a contemporary, digital version of the Vanitas of the 17th century. In the images presented in the Vanity studies series, parts of objects from the traditional illustrative repertory of Vanitas are intermingled with contemporary elements inspired by new technology. The series of processed objects, which only exists as images in digital form, can be interpreted in a number of ways. These multiple interpretations are justified to a certain extent by the existence of characteristics which remind us of the previous identity of the objects. The viewer inevitably identifies a version of a plant, a nautilus shell or a sunflower with cables in the vanitas objects portrayed.

However, this process is constantly interrupted by unexpected illustrative elements discovered when perusing the composition. In the digital Vanitas the interest lies in the active role the viewer is called on to play, not only confined to detecting and identifying the image of the enigmatic object depicted in the compositions but also proceeding to interpret to interpret it.

Natassa Markidou, February 2003

Introduction for Camera Obscura Publication, Winter 2004

I shall not attempt here to describe all the techniques and tools employed by Viktor Koen – it would not serve any purpose. Nor shall I embark on an exhaustive account of all the many details in the images the artist creates. I am not interested so much in the myth – if such a myth exists – forming the initial inspiration for the Vanity Studies series, as in the images themselves, products of imagination each one of which comprises its own myth.

Koen really has no need for his own camera; he does not agonise over apertures and speeds, different kinds of film. Like the sights of a gun, his eye marks down and stores in the sensitive part of his brain the thousand pieces of information which, at the crucial moment, will forfeit their original shape and conceptual status, submitting to the absolute creative alchemy of the artist’s disposing eye. There is no need for Koen, like Magritte to tell us ‘ceci n’est pas une pipe’. His images are thrust upon us, our objections swept aside by the force of his unrivalled ability to compose –from a host of dissimilar component parts– virgin images, ‘transformables’ and ‘transmutables’. In the works in question the use of black should not be interpreted as a gothic feature, with all the historical connotations that would entail. Koen replaces the existing rules with those –far more strict– of his own. His most important quality –the restless, ascetic scrutiny of the existing microcosm – results in images that command one’s acceptance. The hyper-realism of the image appears natural, as if one might encounter one of his figures around the next corner, greeting one politely. He never feels the need to explain his compositions. A bird-child is a bird-child, a cogwheel-eye is a cogwheel-eye. The image neither implies nor intimates – it merely proposes. Those who find the strangeness of his forms bewildering should approach them without attempting to analyse the details, without puzzling over possible meanings. His work must be appreciated through a comprehensive apprehension of the proposed image in its entirety; one must avoid the danger of missing the wood for the trees.

Dimitris Th. Arvanitis, November 2004

Artist's statement

Vanity studies is a series of still-life images, based on the 17th century "Vanitas" paintings, depicting compositions of objects that symbolized the vanity of worldly things and the brevity of life. After the initial research on the Vanitas theme, my attention was turned to the compositional and aesthetic challenges, since the conceptual strength was established and would be consistent through the series, without specific ideas per picture. This allowed for a more expressive process since images were not dictated by a carefully selected title, but the spontaneous visual chemistry between objects that take on unconventional meanings. Components of the traditional compositions were mixed with contemporary and technology inspired elements, in order to graduate the symbolic value of the imagery to the present.

The objects were first captured through a flat bed scanner and then they were combined digitally. Scanning is a "primitive" form of digital photography, able to define and retain texture, detail, distortion and dramatic light values by eliminating the distance between the subject and the lens. The on-screen method allows for solid and translucent interaction between the elements, resulting to a multidimensional final composition, diametrically different from its mostly static predecessors. Another difference is the lack of color, that gives these monochromatic prints an x-ray like quality that reflects the original intentions of their 17th century prototypes.

As an artist infatuated with technology, its shapes and surfaces, this series has been an opportunity to approach organic subjects and made me discover, or better rediscover, nature's relevance as the foundation to all. Even though my work is character centric, this sharp thematic turn to still-lifes was possible in part because the Vanitas were characterized by a prominently displayed skull, a motif I consider visually stunning and symbolically potent. Vanity Studies is a series that refers not so much to the futility of what does not last, but the surprising aesthetic qualities of the ordinary.

Viktor Koen, September 2002