joshgunsuleymanov.art
Throughout history, the human body has maintained a direct relationship with nature. Today, that relationship is increasingly mediated by cosmetic products, laboratory formulas, and technology. While nature is often transformed into a product, the desire for physical contact with it remains. This photographic series explores a quiet encounter between a human and a snail. Here, the snail is neither an exotic creature nor simply a cosmetic ingredient. It becomes a point of contact between two living beings. As it slowly moves across the skin, leaving its delicate trace behind, the human body briefly becomes a shared surface between different forms of life. The project exists at the intersection of documentary observation and experimental photography. All images are created using in-camera optical techniques. Soft focus, refractions, and optical distortions do not seek to reproduce reality faithfully but rather to convey the sensation of the encounter itself. This series is not about beauty or skincare. It is a visual reflection on a brief, silent, and reciprocal moment of contact between the human body and nature. For me, metamorphosis is not a physical transformation but a transformation of perception.
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About

I, Joshgun Suleymanov (b. October 9, 1987, Baku), am an artist working across the disciplines of photography and cinema, grounding my visual narrative in a conceptual and philosophical framework. In my work, I create surreal and metaphorical connections between the forms of objects and the aesthetics of the human body, reinterpreting the fragility of the "living" through inanimate forms.
Joshgun Suleymanov — Artist Statement
"My creative practice is fundamentally rooted in deep, intense observation. The visual moments and details I encounter on the streets and within the layers of the city leave such a profound imprint on me that I engrave these scenes into my mind. Quite often, I pursue those very scenes and atmospheres that I missed or couldn’t capture in the moment; I wander the streets for days, sometimes months, never giving up on the search until I find them.
My creative process begins even before I leave my house, guided by a script already written in my mind, born from these observations and dreams. Camera in hand, I step out into the world to find the characters, figures, and environments belonging to that script. It could be a landfill, a desolate wasteland, or even a simple discarded napkin on the ground; if I catch the lines and the feeling I have been seeking within it, I press the shutter, and the puzzle in my mind falls perfectly into place.
Many capture merely the physical, documentary image of an object or a landscape. My own distinct process, however, truly begins right after that shot is taken. I bring that raw reality home and apply my own alternative visual technique. As a result, the object or scenery that everyone knows and sees fragments, transforming into a human figure breaking free from my subconscious, an angelic form, or a conceptual symbol. Documentary realism undergoes a total visual metamorphosis.
I completely reject digital software, Photoshop, and the smooth, synthetic perfection brought by artificial intelligence. The unusual textures and hazy layers in my work are not added later on a computer; they are generated directly in-camera, staying strictly loyal to the discipline of analog photography. This philosophical quest, stretching from Plato's 'Allegory of the Cave' to Kafka's transformations, means that for me, a photograph is not just a recording of a moment, but the visual 'sealing of time' itself within the frame."

Joshgun Suleymanov
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Projects