A climbing photographer of international renown.

Marcin’s photos have been awarded in many prestigious international photographic competitions and gained acclaim of the most influential climbing magazines in Poland and abroad.

Here’s how Marcin describes his story and his approach to photography...

I am a graduate of the Faculty of Arts at the Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin. I have been climbing since 2001, I belong to the Lublin Kotłownia Climbing Club and KS Korona in Krakow also I have the license of a sport climbing instructor since 2009.  My adventure with a camera has started while still in college, but only when I combined photography and climbing it turned into a real passion.

The fact that I am an active climber myself helps me to capture the beauty of movement and dynamics of the scenes photographed in the rocks. Artistic education and studies of art history mean that I attach great importance to formal solutions - composition, geometric arrangement of the photo, color accents as well as light distribution. The photos I take are often created as a result of previous thoughts, preparations and experiments. I often observe where the climber performs the most interesting sequences of movements - sometimes before the session I research the location to know when the light will be best and where I should hang the rope to get the most interesting perspective and frame… I attach great importance to details - I make sure that there is no mess under the rock. Even in my backpack I always have two or three additional colored T-shirts for my models, so if necessary, I can better match the colors of the scene. Although a lot of photos are usually taken during the session, I always make an absolute selection and choose only one or two of the best of them, in which I managed to put everything together into one perfect whole. I also spend a lot of time editing the photo, treating it as an integral part of the creative process, which allows me to extract the atmosphere and mood from the photo and show the moment in the most attractive way possible. I think that the style of the photographer is expressed not only in the frames he creates, but also in the style of editing the photo.

I'm a guy whose passion has become to taking photos of people with passion. Climbing photography allows me to touch the experiences of climbs, which I never be able to do myself. It allows me to travel, to be witness of great climbs, accompany in the adventures of brilliant climbers and spent time with good friends and share the all experiences with them, show these all inspiring moments. The camera is an inseparable part of my gear during trips to rock crags and mountains. So far I have visited climbing crags not only in Poland, but also in Austria, Czech Republic, Croatia, Greece, France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Morocco, Portugal, Switzerland, Turkey. In addition to climbing and photographing climbers, I'm also interested in portrait, landscape and product photography as well as history of art.

My photos have won a number of awards and prizes at international competitions and have been published in prestigious climbing magazines in Europe and the USA. I had a pleasure and honor to work with the best climbers in Poland belonged to the world's top - the best 9b rock climber Piotr Schab and Speedclimbing World Champion Aleksandra Mirosław. Recently, photography has become not only my passion, but also a profession. In the "Visual Experience" company that I founded, I have expanded the scope of topics I deal with to product, advertising, sports, lifestyle and business photography.

AWARDS:

2021 - International Photography Awards - 3rd Award in Extreme Sport Category 

2021 - 7th CVCE Photo - Donostia/San Sebastian - 1st Award 

2021 - XXXI Memorial Maria Luisa - 1st Award in "Mountain Climbing" Category, Honorable Mention in „Topic of the Year: Black and White Photography” Category 

2020 - XXX Memorial Maria Luisa - Honorable Mention in „Escalada de Roca” Category

2020 - Monochrome Photography Awards – Honorable Mention in Street Category 

2019 - International Photography Awards - 2nd and 3rd Award in Winter Sports Category, Honorable Mention in Extreme Sport Category, Honorable Mention in Fine Art/Landscape Category

2019 - Monochrome Photography Awards – Honorable Mention in Landscape Category, Honorable Mention in Portrait Category 

2018 - Chromatic Photography Awards - 2nd, 3rd Award and Honorable Mention in Sport Category, Honorable Mention in Landscape Category

2018 - International Photography Awards - 2nd Award in Winter Sports Category, Honorable Mention in Extreme Sport Category

2018 - MonoVision Photography Awards – Honorable Mention in Landscape Category

2013 - Polski Związek Alpinizmu - Competition "Życie na koniuszkach palców" - Honorable Mention

2010 - FujiFilm Competition "Ekstremalny Maks" - 1st Award 

PUBLICATIONS IN PRESTIGIOUS NATIONAL AND FOREIGN MEDIA:
Góry - Górski Magazyn Sportowy, Taternik /Poland/ – editorials and covers;
GymClimber, Rock&Ice Magazine, Climbing Magazine (cover) /USA/;
Klettern&Bouldern (editorials and cover), TMMS Verlag /Germany/;
Casopis Montana /Czech Republic/;
Desnivel /Spain/.