One of the elementary conditions of photography as a medium that generates pictures is the historical claim to reality, based on the assumption that the photographed picture represents a slice of existing reality. Analog photography—which is the medium Istvan Balogh used to produce the works under discussion—is unlike other visual arts inasmuch as it can only represent. The potential of digital technology would, of course, permit creating pictures in the phenomenological code of photography without a referent, without any existing reality, but Balogh makes traditional, conventional use of the camera. He does not technically alter or alienate the pictures; the realties he (re)presents do not come from the computer. Light waves that go through the lens create the picture. The representation has a source; the photograph corresponds to a real referent. But: Istvan Balogh’s reality is artificial through and through; it is entirely staged.

Balogh begins with a precise visual idea, which he then executes down to the finest detail until he has everything under control. He composes and arranges with the greatest of care, selects his location, places his extras, determines facial expressions and gestures, puts every property in the right position—and only then does he press the shutter release. The resulting photographs thus show scenes staged specifically  for the camera despite the first-glance impression that the camera has merely happened upon them.

Extract from: "Between Time, Sign and Reality" 

Andreas Fiedler