Interview of Cenk Erdogan - @cenkerdogan

Hello Jo, you are the "Best Street Photo project" 2024. What do you think about being selected as a winner among hundreds of other photographers ?

Having been 'seriously' into photography for more than 30 years, I've always stayed under the radar, maybe because I'm not great at networking.

So, I was mainly very surprised, but also proud and happy to have won this wonderful award.

The PISPA isn't the first competition I've participated in, but it's the first time I've found myself among the winners, except for the National Prize for Open Photography at the Museum of Photography in Charleroi (Belgium) 15 years ago.

Can you tell us about your background and how you became a photographer ?

I started taking photos when my little sister — who unfortunately passed away — began studying photography in the late 80s. She would regularly lend me her FM2, with which I took concert photos, memories for my friends. A friend who was living in a squat taught me how to develop my films and make prints. Then, I enrolled in an academy, but it didn't last long, as I was already 28 at the time and had my head in the clouds (lol).

After a few years of working as a lighting technician on film sets, I switched to unit still photography. I worked on more than 130 feature films and TV series, including Belgian productions as well as international co-productions. In the meantime, I was still working as an assistant on fashion and advertising shoots, but that world didn't really appeal to me.

Since my early days in photography, I've always loved capturing slices of life in the street. Catching those fleeting moments when all the elements of composition fall into place. I've wasted a lot of time like that, waiting for that damned 'decisive moment' (lol).

Far from being exhaustive, here’s a list of photographers who have always inspired me: Mary Ellen Mark, Ernest Cole, David Goldblatt, Gordon Parks, Bruce Davidson, Carl De Keyzer, Diane Arbus, HCB, Raymond Depardon, Lee Friedlander, Martin Parr, Marc Riboud, Don McCullin, Harry Gruyaert, Garry Winogrand, Alex Webb, Robert Frank, Walker Evans, ...

What about the series « Sidewalks », How did you build this project, and what are your plans for the future ?

The Sidewalks series is just a glimpse of the black-and-white street photos I’ve taken over the years. I’ve been using this title for a long time because it’s mainly on sidewalks that street photography happens.

For the PISPA, I selected 15 images that I feel represent my style quite well. I want something to happen in the image. I want the situation to either make someone smile or shed a tear, provoke a reflection on life, sometimes stir empathy, or even make someone burst out laughing !

As for the future...

The arrival of digital photography marked a big change in my workflow on film sets. Producers no longer wanted to reimburse the cost of film and development. As a result, I could take many more photos, but it also meant I spent a lot of time in front of my computer doing post-production.

For my personal work, I'm trying to return to the source, which for me is analog photography. I still have all my analog cameras. I also miss the darkroom.

I am currently working on a black-and-white portrait series with my old Mamiya C220.

I would also love to restart a project in South Africa, photographing people posing with old family photos. However, for the continuity of this series of colour portraits shot with my Canon 5D Mk III (great camera), I’ll use the same camera.

As the winner of our photo contest, what advice can you give to photographers who want to apply next year ?

Don't forget your camera at home (lol).

Believe in yourself and don't give up, even after multiple failures. Stay curious, keep an open mind, and continue exploring the world around you. It’s not always necessary to travel far to find unusual, funny, sad, ugly, or beautiful situations...

Be hard on yourself: get rid of mediocre images, they take up too much space on hard drives.

Take your time when selecting your photos, and in the case of a series, make sure you find the right rhythm in the sequence.

Study the work of classic street photographers: I see too many images where nothing really happens, but they are labeled “street photography” simply because that’s where they were taken.

Jo Voets (@jovoets), who lives in Brussels, has worked as a unit stills photographer on over 130 movie sets.

It is on these film sets -where nothing is ever quite what it seems- that he developed the skill to work quickly and discreetly, capturing the essence of a scene in just a few frames.

This work stands in stark contrast to his street and documentary photography, where he empathetically captures the humanity of his subjects in a single glance or gesture. The realism of his personal work is often confronting but never disrespectful.

Laureate of the Prix National de la Photographie Ouverte, Musée de la Photographie Charleroi.
Laureate PISPA Best Street Photo project – gold medal in the category Film Photography.