Krzysztof Filla   Photo Gallery

The first picture I took was in 1993 when I bought my first "super faulty" Russian camera - Zenit 12XP. Only 2 out of 6 rolls of films were all right, because the camera broke films. A year later I purchased a Praktika BX20s, which was useful until 2000, when it failed me in the most unexpected moment. It refused to work when I wandered to the foot of Mt. Everest in Nepal. And to make things worse, in my second new compact camera the battery went flat at the same time. I walked for a whole week carrying 2 cameras which I couldn‘t use. Usually I only photographed once a year to record my holiday, but the situation changed when in 2001 I bought my next camera a Canon EOS 30. Since then I tend to use my photo equipment more often, but with films it was usually limited due to my finance. More often than not I used the cheapest but trustworthy films such as Fuji Superia 100-400 ASA and since 1999 I started to use slides such as Fuji Sensia or Kodak Elite. In May 2007 I bought a new Canon EOS 300 as a supplementary body. With the coming of the year 2008 I shifted to digital system and presently I photograph with canon EOS 5D and 40D. Obviously it does not mean I resigned from my analogue camera.To prove I do not speak in vain at the and of 2008 I bought analog camera Voigtlander Bessa R3A and exactly a year later middle-format Mamiya RZ67.
Why do I photograph? Because our memory is fallible, and pictures are the reflection of the past. I photograph, because I want to show others what they may never see, sort of sharing my life. I take pictures, because it is my passion and I like the sound of a shutter.

Since my childhood I‘ve had a passion for bicycles. Initially, I had a very popular Russian bicycle, but when I reached age of 14 I bought a second hand road bike. In my spare time together with my other friends we organized day trips within 60-70km of my village. In 1993 I bought a bicycle, which was a subject of my dream a new "Scott" trekking bike, from which my passion for traveling started. Within the same year, I hit the road and cycled more or less around Poland. As for me it was a great achievement, because my average cycling distance was 160 km a day and the longest one exceeded over 230 km. Within the 2 weeks of my holidays I went slightly over 2000 km. Next year I went along with my friend for a 3 weeks bike tour of Austria. Enchanted by the Alps, I decided to return there. A year later in 1995 I organized an expedition in order to reach the summit of the highest Mountain in Europe - Mont Blanc (4810 m). My appetite to experience adventure farther away from home grew year by year. In 1996 I got a proposition from my friends to go to Norway, to the northmost cape of Europe - North cape. During my previous trip to Austria an idea was born in my mind, that I would visit the whole Europe on a bicycle, that I would go around Europe. In 1997 I set out as a one man daredevil in a race throughout Europe. The tour lasted for almost 6 months and I covered a distance of 10 000 km. My love towards mountains and an interest in Hindu culture (music, cuisine, religion) had an influence on my next journey and in 1999 I went to conquer the Himalayas and India. The overland trip to India resulted in a couple of acquaintanceships and for that reason in 2002 I came to Tehran. In Iran I spent less than 3 months and 90% of the time in Tehran, because as I‘ve written above, it was a social visit. I dreamed about a trip around the world but loneliness and a lack of finances contributed to giving up the venture. I decided to limit my plan just to a travel by Trans-Siberian railway, through Far East to Australia. Unfortunately, after counting the real expenses, I had to give up this idea too. Ultimately, in 2004 I decided to travel throughout Russia, Mongolia, up to south of China and return trip. 4 years were passing of my travel stagnation and till 2009 I headed for India but this time to the South. Thinking of the 4 years of not travelling I try to catch up and this year (2010) I am heading off in to Malaysia to see the remnants of the rainforest.
Why do I travel? Because I like to discover and learn from my discoveries. It is like getting away from distorted reality that surrounds us, which is created by people who possess power and money. Therefore I can create my own reality based on understanding the world.

There have been many articles written in news papers about myself, but all of them are in Polish. There was one written in German from an Swiss news paper "TAGBLATT" that I decided to include here. As in every news paper some of the information is untrue. For example it is written there that I ate a sausage but in fact it was a cheese roll, since I do not eat meet as a vegetarian. But after all it is nice memento.

Since 1989 it‘s been an essential part of my life, resulting from my concern with the world. I try to live in a harmony with the world that surrounds us, therefore whenever I can I use a bicycle, I buy products that do not leave too much rubbish etc. “According to the report of World Health Organization, the amount of food produced in the world could feed not just 6 billion but 17 billion people”. When I travel across the world I see skinny and malnourished people. Consumption of meat escalates the problem of hunger, because plants that are used to feed animals would feed the 2/3 of undernourished humans. When I write, I care about our world I also think of the cruelty and tortures of farmed animals. They sense pain exactly in the same way as we do. I encourage you to download the following movies and watch them as they only last a few minutes. It is worth to ask yourself if consumption of meat and wearing animal products increase the demand and at the same time I contribute to treating animals in the way it is shown in these movies.
There are many aspects of vegetarianism about which I am not mentioning, because the gallery is not a place for that. In the internet there are many publications which are worth of interest if you are not indifferent. For example: www.themeatrix.com , www.vegsoc.org , www.goveg.com

The gallery was launched in December 2004. Ever since I added some pictures and changed the graphic layout. I converted the HTML language to XHTML and PHP. It seems to me that this form of the gallery is user friendly and looks good in all popular internet browsers. The main changes happened within the first year of its existence. Later there were little cosmetic changes and I launched the English version. If you want to see (compare) my gallery at the very beginning of its existance, you can look here: www.filla.pl/old

Copying, publishing and any usage of photographs without permission of the author is a crime. Therefore it is forbidden to use any content of the website without permission of the author ©2004-2010.