Tim Lytvinenko: Love Language Photoessay

For several years now Tim Lytvinenko has captured some of the most interesting performances and moments on tour for local musicians.  Lytvinenko's technique brings the images a quality of emotion and the moment.  Recently Lytvinenko shot the Love Language one evening as they covered the Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat.  Tonight, the products of that shoot whill be on exhibit at the Raleigh Denim Workshop along with the Love Language's leader Stu McLamb performing solo starting around 9pm.  You can see more of Lytvinenko's work here on New Raleigh and at NewTim.com.

David: How do you pick your subjects?

Tim: Thats a good question. This year all my projects have been personal projects and the big one i chose is documenting the local music scene. This is something I have been interested in for a long time and started by documenting a bunch of house shows back in college. Now the local music scene has really taken off with places Kings, Slims, Tir Na Nog and Pour House having multiple local shows each week. I feel like Raleigh is getting on to the map musically . As far as individual subjects within this project, I gravitate to honest and fun bands or people.

David: The photos, they all have this quality of movement.  It seems like you are ok with some blur, things that other photographers might consider technical errors, what are you thinking about when you are shooting?  What are you trying to capture?

Tim: I try to capture a feeling. It's less about documenting what happened and more about bringing viewers back to that day and having them feel it, not see it. things like motion blur and out of focus are definitely technical errors but when you use them to move your story forward it works.

David: Do you do much post processing?

Tim:  Yes, all my photos are digital and I see the toning process the same as printing photos in the darkroom.
David: Do you have any influences in photography?

Tim: Elliott Erwitt, Annie Lebowitz (her early work), Ernst Haas, Paolo Pellegrin, Trent Parke, too many to list out. Erwitt's humor, Lebowitz work with the rolling stones in the 70's, Haas's color, Pellegrin's moments and Parke's ability to take you into a dream world

Locally a lot of the N&O photographers helped me develop my style like Juli Leonard, Robert Willett, Travis Long and Takaaki Iwabu. Juli's Found essay taught me how to shoot life including my own.

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