I’ve just returned from a long 3,500-kilometer journey through Italy. Five days on the road, sleeping little, driving from one location to another, always with my large-format camera in the trunk. Brutalism. Cactus. In total I exposed 150 sheets of film.
Long hours alone in the car give you time to think and process. I need those times in order to find out what I want and what direction to go. I am very intuitive in what I am doing but also carefully plan my life. I build my life intentionally.
I found myself thinking about photography, about my way of seeing, and also about how thankful and privileged I feel to work with galleries that truly believe in my work. I have a “cloud of collectors” that mean a lot to me.
At the same time, I was thinking about many of my friends—artists and photographers—striving to enter the art world, hoping to find a gallery that will represent them. Again, I feel very grateful that somehow I made it—unexpectedly, perhaps. I was never really chasing it. Somehow I was got discovered by galleries.
Just ten days ago I was in Amsterdam, standing in museums in front of paintings by Van Gogh, Modigliani, Cézanne, Frida Kahlo and many other modern masters. During those many hours on the road I had time to reflect on what we are actually chasing today.
We often dream of the lives of Picasso, Modigliani, and Cézanne—modern masters who seemed to breathe art. In their time, and partly through them, the gallery world in Paris blossomed. By the 1930s one street alone boasted more than twenty galleries; Paris likely had dozens, perhaps over a hundred. In many ways the modern system of galleries and collectors was born in that era. Their success—and the prices their works achieve today—have become a benchmark we still chase.
But when we speak about their dedication or their obsession, we often romanticize it. What it really meant was sacrifice. They gave up stability, security, and comfort. Many lived in poverty. Relationships suffered. Their entire life revolved around one thing: making art. There was no safety net, no backup plan, no parallel career. Art was not something they did—it was the only thing they could do.
Today we live in a world of 8.2 billion people. Paris alone now has more than 2,000 galleries, yet the number is again shrinking (like everywhere in the world). At the same time, the number of artists seems to be exploding. We compare ourselves to those heroes, yet the ecosystem is completely different.
The difference, I believe, is not only competition—it is commitment. Today many people call themselves artists, but for many it remains a hobby, something that fits into the spaces between other ambitions. The word “artist” has become easy to claim. But the life behind it—the willingness to sacrifice everything for the work—is much rarer.
At the same time, digital visibility has changed the game. In a world where billions of people can see what we do, the temptation is strong to copy what already works. Instead of creating from necessity, we begin reproducing what is successful.
And so I realize something: the illusion is not their fame. The illusion is believing we are playing the same game.
Perhaps success today is not about reaching the prices of those masters or repeating their stories. Perhaps it is about rediscovering the same inner necessity they had—the quiet but unstoppable force that makes someone create, not because it is profitable, fashionable, or visible, but because they simply cannot do otherwise.
To create because we must.
And I believe that work created from this place will always find its way into the world of art—and eventually into galleries.