The Black Eye

The Black Eye continues Michal Chelbin¿s exploration of the world of athletes and performers. The wrestlers in this series are studies in contrasts: youth and manhood, strength and weakness, splendor and roughness. Also apparent is a contrast in the pairing of luscious, vibrant colored backgrounds and the raw, sometime bruised surfaces of the subjects¿ skin. Breathless, sweaty and fatigued, the athletes in the book are worn out after a hard training session or fight. During a typical photo shoot, Chelbin makes the athletes change poses and locations several times, sometimes continuing past the point of exhaustion to help free the subjects from self-conscious expression. Chelbin searches for a moment in which they have almost calmed their breath but not yet regained their self-awareness. It is a moment when they have lifted their masks, and surrendered to the camera.