10 Questions with Julia Posta

Julia Posta is a Hungarian photographer based in the UK. She has always been drawn to photography. After twenty years working in a different field, she returned to study and became a photographer in 2021.

She focuses on abstraction and experimentation. Inspired by the fluidity of watercolour, she brings its organic spontaneity into her photographic process. She works to create images that blur the line between accident and intention. She looks for hidden compositions in everyday elements, capturing patterns, textures, and colour interactions that often go unnoticed. Her work invites the viewer to pause and engage with the beauty of impermanence.

juliaposta.com | @julia.posta.artist

ARTIST STATEMENT

Julia Posta is a fine art photographer. She photographs flowers frozen in ice. Her work is guided by the theory of intrinsically disordered proteins. These forms lack a fixed structure yet remain functional. This idea informs her choices in composition, structure, and detail.

She works in natural light. Each photograph is made after the subject is frozen. The ice reveals patterns, distortions, and colour fields. She seeks to capture the suspended state where life has passed, yet traces of vitality remain.

Her focus is on the tension between order and disorder. She asks the viewer to study colour shifts, edges, and the balance between sharp and soft areas. She directs attention to structure without symmetry.

Her work appears in two collections: Intrinsically Disordered Petals and Baroque. This second series explores richer tones and denser visual fields. All works are limited edition giclée prints on archival paper.

Baroque 3, Photography, A2, 2023-2024 © Julia Posta

INTERVIEW

Let’s start from the basics. What first inspired you to pick up a camera and explore photography?

I did not come to photography in the usual way, I started late. I have been drawn to the visual arts since childhood. As a cultural coordinator, I worked in an international environment and saw up close how different cultures respond to their surroundings and to change. I searched for my own medium for a long time. I also painted, but I did not feel at home there. Photography came instinctively. I received good feedback early, and more and more people encouraged me. I realised I am an observer, I am interested more in detail and mood, not in documenting events. For me, photography is a personal, subjective medium.

After working in another field for twenty years, what motivated you to return to study and become a photographer in 2021?

During COVID, I also reconsidered what mattered and what I was missing, so I stopped postponing. I felt the only way to grow was to study.

Baroque 6, Photography, A2, 2023-2024 © Julia Posta

How did you begin working with flowers frozen in ice, and what drew you to this subject?

Honestly, it started from a school project. In the course, we covered every genre, and when we got to abstraction, I tried flowers frozen in ice. The first trials showed how varied the subject is. The ice’s patterns, bubbles, and cracks brought something different each time. I was drawn to the play between control and chance. That makes it feel alive. That is why it stayed as my main subject.

Can you explain, in simple terms, how the theory of intrinsically disordered proteins influences your work?

There are proteins that, in a free state, do not adopt a single stable three-dimensional form. The environment shapes them. I translate that idea into images. The petals in ice are not stable; their state is momentary. What matters is not only how they froze but also how much they melted while I photographed them. The image is a slice of a process, not an end state. It is this contingency that interests me. Everyone has a picture of flowers in mind. Freezing reveals unexpected forms, yet the pattern remains readable as a flower: petals, veins, a mesh of fibres.

What is your process for preparing and photographing your subjects?

I choose seasonal flowers and experiment a lot. Large petals rarely melt in a pleasing way. Flowers with smaller petals work better. The process is almost embarrassingly simple. I place the flower in water in a simple freezer container and freeze it. The ice does the rest. Before shooting, I take it out and let it melt for a few minutes so the block releases from the container. I work in front of a white poster board with natural light. While it melts, I make short series and focus on the crop. This way, we do not see the flower first; we see the form. The viewer either follows the line or looks for the origin.

You often work with natural light. Why is that important to your images?

Natural light gives true colour and subtle transitions. I never thought to make these images in a studio. It would feel alien. Natural light fits more with how the material behaves. It is also true that the melting forces me to work quickly; there is no time to set up lights and keep adjusting them.

How do you see the balance between order and disorder in your photographs?

For me, the order is in the preparation. I choose the flowers, I layer, and I set the crop. Disorder is born in the ice as it cracks, traps bubbles, and melts. During shooting, I do not fight it; I observe and respond. I move close, change angles, and keep looking until form and rhythm come together.

Can you tell us a bit about your two collections, Intrinsically Disordered Petals and Baroque?

Intrinsically Disordered Petals is an ongoing project and keeps growing with new images. It looks at transience, resilience, and how structure emerges within disorder. Baroque, by contrast, was a one-off project. A single bouquet grew into a full collection. I was interested in whether the boundary between photography and painting can be blurred. Flower depiction has a strong tradition in painting, which makes it a hard field for me, and that is exactly what I like about it.

Baroque 11, Photography, A2, 2023-2024 © Julia Posta

What do you hope people feel or think when they look at your work?

I have always liked it when we do not know exactly what we are looking at at first. I am drawn to abstraction. What is most interesting in the shapes of frozen flowers is that if we look only at the pattern, we do not think of the origin. We begin to decode the form. That means something different to everyone. Everyone reads the image differently. Some watch the pattern and search for a likeness to a known form. Others go deeper and look for the origin. Either path is fine. The point is the play. We build the image together. In one word, what I hope for is a sense of wonder.

And lastly, are you working on any new ideas or projects at the moment?

Yes, I am working on a new body of work. The flowers remain, but the ice gives way to other materials. I am interested in how a three-dimensional installation meets the two-dimensional photograph.

Artist’s Talk

Al-Tiba9 Interviews is a promotional platform for artists to articulate their vision and engage them with our diverse readership through a published art dialogue. The artists are interviewed by Mohamed Benhadj, the founder & curator of Al-Tiba9, to highlight their artistic careers and introduce them to the international contemporary art scene across our vast network of museums, galleries, art professionals, art dealers, collectors, and art lovers across the globe.

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