Magda Biernat

From the series “Units of Separation”. Singapore 2008

Magda Biernat (b.1978, Poland) obtained her BFA in Photography from Wielkopolska School of Photography. In 1992 she moved to the United States and started working at Magnum Photos. Surrounded by great photo-journalistic works at Magnum she turned her interests towards a different specialty, and begun photographing architecture and interiors. She worked as a Picture Editor at Metropolis Magazine and in 2007 decided to take off for a year long trip around the world. While traveling to more than 17 countries she worked on her personal projects concerning urban landscape and habitat. She is currently enrolled in an MFA program at the Transart Institute. Magdat has exhibited internationally since 2001 with solo exhibitions in Poland, Belgium and United States. She is a recipient of the TMC/Kodak Grant and a Lucie Award among others.

About the Photograph:

“This photograph was taken in Singapore, where I photographed several apartment complexes. Visiting each floor, I documented the small personal items left outside of otherwise identical homes: bikes, shoes, shrines and drying laundry of all different colors. It was fascinating for me to see the ways the occupants had personalized their exterior spaces to separate themselves from other units. Apartment blocks became a worldwide phenomenon in the 1960’s as city planners cast off design based on human scale and began construction on a future of managed density. Units of Separation is an exploration of the way people maintain their individuality while being part of a collective and how units of space meant to foster communal harmony can actually threaten our sense of community. While a resident may come to know their immediate neighbor, it is possible they may never meet the person living directly above them.”