1: In Forrest I/II; 1.–21. 10. 2001
2: Grass – Snow; 12.–16. 3. 2004
3: Burdock 2, I/II; 26. 9.–4. 10. 2007
4: Grass3 I/III; 1.– 6.–10. 4. 2001
5: Pool (black) — First snow; 15.–22. 11. 2008
6: Grass — Snow; 21.–30. 1. 2007

I have the great fortune of knowing Jiří Šigut personally. I find his approach to life and to creation, as well as his works themselves, tremendously inspiring. His work is, above all, liberating.

Šigut’s photographic papers, lying for several days or months on the surface of rivers, in grass, pine needles or under snow, humbly absorb records of natural events, and capture time periods longer than we are accustomed to with classical photography. Even here, nevertheless, the principle of recording light on a photo-sensitive layer of photographic paper applies, with the difference that the resultant image is not developed in developer. It is sufficient to submerge the paper in fixer for all the surprising colours to reveal themselves.

The principles of chance and the suppression of one’s own subjective interference are characteristic even of Šigut’s early conceptual work, in which he used a camera, always individually, to layer ordinary actions and experiences on one negative frame. Supermarket shopping, travelling on the bus, a walk or 12 minutes of rain… the banality of everyday situations thus suddenly gains beauty and the events themselves attain significance – with distance it is possible to see their legitimate place within life as a whole. This applies similarly to leaves or raindrops that have fallen on Šigut’s photographic paper – repeating processes that are otherwise almost trivial are captured in their uniqueness and at the same time refer to cosmic events and the world as a whole. The creation of timelessness, unlike typical photography, however, takes place by means of touch – the paper comes into direct contact with natural events, which have taken place here for thousands of years. The haptic nature of the resultant impressions of layered time is especially impressive in the context of the current madness involving digital photographs, which do not in principal have to take on tactile form, and which can be irreversibly eliminated from the world in the same rapid manner in which they were created. Perhaps this too is a reason for the artist’s need to continually return to the night landscape, with which he makes contact not only via his photographic paper but also his body and all his senses; it does not diminish, but conversely increases further.

From the recording of fragments of human life, where he is fascinated by the possibility of reliving them based on their being captured, Jiří Šigut has come to an interest in capturing the events of the universe of which human life is a part. He accepts all these traces without selection, in their given form. By his choice of subject he influences only the format, place and time of the record, as well as, of course, the final adjustments. He never discards photographic paper nor considers any to be less valuable than others, no matter how they look. His acceptance of reality without ambition to fundamentally change it indicates a great internal freedom. Time flows and things happen, and nothing remains for us other than to learn to take them as they are.

– Lenka Sedláčková