The Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies is pleased to announce that Jelena Šalaj has been awarded the 2024-2025 Baumanis Grant for Creative Projects in Baltic Studies for her book project “North of Photography.”
The Baumanis Grant is an award made to honor Velta Marija Baumanis of Mount Brydges, Ontario, who left a generous bequest to AABS at the end of her career as an architect. An award of up to $7,000 is available for any creative project (e.g., book, film, exhibit, etc.) that promotes Baltic studies. Preference is given to topics with a pan-Baltic or comparative aspect. Applicants must be members of the AABS at the time of application.
The 2024 applications were evaluated by the AABS 2022–2024 Grants Committee consisting of AABS VP for Professional Development Dr. Kaarel Piirimäe, AABS President Dr. Dovilė Budrytė, AABS Director-at-Large Dr. Daunis Auers, and AABS Treasurer Uģis Sprūdžs, CFA. Learn about the other 2024-2025 recipients here.
![Jelena Šalaj A black and white photo of a smiling woman with glasses](https://media.aabs-balticstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/02161145/photo-295x300.jpg)
© Jelena Šalaj
Jelena Šalaj is a psychologist, lecturer and researcher at Vilnius University (Lithuania) working in the field of feminist visual studies. Her research focuses on analogue photography practices, domestic photography, and the intersection of motherhood and photography.
Šalaj has long practiced analogue photography and is a mother – over time, both of these experiences have become integral to her academic research and writing. Recognizable for their distinctive form, her academic essays, written in clear, lively, and personal language, articulate complex conceptual ideas and have become her signature trait.
Project Abstract
The book with the working title North of Photography will be dedicated to contemporary analogue photography, focusing on the works and professional paths of photographers from the Baltic countries. The book combines several different disciplines: Photography, Feminist Visual Studies, and Baltic Studies.
The title of the book has several different meanings. First of all, we live in a period where the rise of digital media is particularly pronounced. Therefore, contemporary female artists who actively use the so-called old or analogue photography technologies in their work can be treated as working in a certain specific, somewhat “anachronistic” field – in the metaphorically called “North of Photography.”
Second, the name refers to the complex and changing identity of Eastern and Central Europe as a region. Sometimes, in the international context, the Baltic countries are classified as Nordic countries and Scandinavia. However, they are also often identified with the Eastern, post-Soviet bloc.
Third, the North usually evokes associations with cold, wind, ice, and other elements that we experience as very tangible, affecting our bodies. In this sense, analogue photography has similar characteristics: it is sensitive, material, unhurried, inviting us to slow down.
The book is based on a narrative approach and draws on the ideas of photography theorists P. Bourdieu, L. Marks, A. Kuhn, G. Ross, M. Hirsh, R. Chalfen and many others. The author of the book – a researcher, photographer, and mother – starts by analysing her own photography experience and then moves to the more general context of the Baltic States. Different aspects of photography and being a woman-photographer are reflected in conversations with Lithuanian (D. Dagienė, G. Paliūšytė and V. Samulionytė), Latvian (I. Balode, V. Eksta, K. Krauze-Slucka) and Estonian artists (B. Püve, M. Kapajeva). The author’s goal is not only to present the artists, but also to talk about their professional paths from different perspectives, e.g., feminist visual studies, Baltic studies, postcolonial studies.
Since this project is rooted in the author’s previous activity, especially recent postdoctoral studies, a lot of work has been done already (interviews with photographers, excerpts published in the local cultural newspaper “Šiaurės Atėnai,” a preliminary agreement with a publishing house). The Baumanis grant will allow the award recipient to gather and work on complementary material, write and edit several chapters, and finalize the book.
The book is expected to be quite unique in terms of format and writing style. The author is coming from academia, but it has always been important for her to communicate to a wider audience. Therefore, Jelena’s texts, although quite complex in a conceptual sense, are written in attractive, clear language and, as author hopes, will be accessible to anyone interested in culture. The book will acquaint the readers with the work of artists from the Baltic countries, broaden the readers’ view of contemporary photography, and contribute to more diverse ways of seeing and reading photography.
–Jelena Šalaj
Jelena Šalaj