Hunting Stands (Czech: Posedy) is a long-term documentary project by Jan Holkup, made between 2009 and 2025 in Bohemia, Moravia, and other parts of Central Europe, focusing on improvised hunting stands in the rural landscape. The series examines "architecture without architects" as a reflection of Central European history and everyday resourcefulness. Open platforms and enclosed pulpits, often built from salvaged materials, embody habits formed in late socialist scarcity and the post-communist DIY economy. Holkup treats these structures as a "second home" for hunters, refuges for solitude, quiet observation, and escape from urban life at a time when attitudes toward hunting are shifting and looming regulations and mass-produced plastic stands threaten what he calls a "slowly disappearing world of freedom."
Holkup adopts a typological visual language that treats each stand as an architectural portrait rooted in its surroundings. Using a wide focal length, a standardized 2:3 format, and large depth of field, he renders both object and landscape in sharp focus, inviting viewers to feel as if they are standing at the site themselves. The photographs are in faithful color, allowing the odd combinations of wood, sheet metal, cisterns, cabins, or septic tanks to articulate the diversity of forms. People are always absent, yet lived-in details convey ongoing use and a quiet, sometimes eccentric, humanity.
Technically speaking, Holkup works with a digital camera, a 24–70 mm zoom and selected longer manual lenses, supported by GPS navigation and careful planning of season, time of day, and light. He returns to locations when needed to balance clarity and atmosphere, and emphasizes that the images are free of manipulation. Listing each municipality beside a photograph doubles as a field note, countering suspicions that these improbable constructions might be digitally fabricated.
Since 2019, Hunting Stands has circulated through exhibitions in Czech and Slovak galleries. The 2025 book published by PositiF, with texts by art historian Tomáš Pospěch and hunting expert David Vaca, consolidates the project as a visual catalog of vernacular ingenuity and improvised architecture.
