NEXT : 27th Feb to 2nd Mar - 2025

HACKNEY ROSE by ALEX WAESPI

CURATED BY : Gabriele Stabile

Website : http://www.alexandrawaespi.com

About :

Canadian-born and of Belizean-Swiss decent, Waespi has lived in London for ten years working as a photographer for the likes of Adele, The New York Times, The Guardian, and more. She has passion for analogue photography and experimentation within the medium, as is epitomised in the Hackney Rose series, for which Waespi uses Polaroid film.

After moving to Hackney, Waespi was struck by the number of roses in the area. Waespi’s map of roses is both a physical and psychogeographic survey of the area. The phrase ‘English rose’ lingers in Waespi’s mind as shr photographs them. The rose as an emblem of England has been tangled in monarchy and religion, but, to the people, the rose typically means something beyond these constructs: the wild and the uncontrollable; the beauty and tenacity of nature; the natural world’s perennial ability to transcend the mortal concerns of human beings.

Photographing mostly at dusk enhances the liminal, trace-like quality Waespi cultivates in her images. These ethereal, spectres of light and colour are the result. “The sky turns this dark blue only fleetingly,” Waespi says. The first expos is made with flash. Then I layer additional exposures on top, in camera, to emphasise the sense of mysticism I fee when I see them. The second double exposure is the petal up-close, so the color of the rose almost breathes onto the frame for a few seconds.”

Volume One of the project will come in an edition of 50. It is a hand-stitched artist zine, a small collection of treasures,

which will be added to each year—product and material willing.