Green A – in the 1970s, only very few people were holders of the pass that opened all doors to the inner state institutions. It was used at the time when I took my first photograph.

Freedom has been a very important topic in my life. The concept of freedom and its meaning. I transformed the concept of freedom throughout my life, and especially through the experience I gained. In this exhibition I showed my very first work that could be regarded as art; those were my first explorations. I took that first photograph with a camera my mother gave me. The camera was made in the GDR. In 1976, during the holidays I spent at my grandparents’ in Stawiszyn, I went to Kalisz, 17 kilometres away, and took a photo of St. Joseph’s Church. It seemed very important as an object. That first negative film included a series of other photos, but this one was absolutely first. A twelve-year-old boy at the time, I thought the world was a very positive place. Yet the photography instructor, who taught me, did not let me make prints from that negative. He said the photo did not make any sense, and I made the print only 25 years later. So this first work of mine is about the effects of limiting freedom.