Tokyo Weekender - December 2017 - January 2018

FROM ABOVE, THE STREETS ARE
GRIDDED CRACKS OF LIGHT. THE
LIGHT IS LIFE. DARKNESS IS DEATH,
CLOAKING THE SKY
perspective to his other series, L’appel du
vide, French for “the call of the void.”
It’s a sequence of rooftop photos, and
named after a phenomenon that urges the
mind to naturally think about self-sabotage
or suicide. When Lukasz wandered
up to rooftops, he’d point his camera down
toward the city and feel the call. “At first
I was just exploring the alleys,” he says,
which eventually led him to look up. From
above, the streets are gridded cracks of
light. The light is life. Darkness is death,
cloaking the sky. Perhaps from a foreigner’s
perspective, the roofs are actually a
refuge from the illuminated eye of a homogenous
world. He says the atmosphere
up there is “serene.”
Other classic Tokyo-inspired flicks
like Akira, Ghost in the Shell, and The 5th
Element also inform his work. They give
him a “feedback loop of inspiration.” To
study how images communicate story,
watching film helps him develop content
and context. “In photos, because it’s a still,
the emphasis is so much on composition.
The really impressive photos have really
wild composition. There are so many layers
to [them]. In movies, that’s sometimes
26 | DEC 2017 - JAN 2018 | TOKYO WEEKENDER