One might say this is landscape work and entitle it "Variations on a Nightscape". And that would miss the whole point. To be sure, when facing these locations, which have been shot deliberately from the front, in the twilight, centring them as accurately as possible in order to allow the space to breathe and so make it comprehensible to someone who has not experienced it and who is looking at it, this series of photographs produces landscape. But it is seeking something else. It is asking questions about today.
In each of these lived-in landscapes, for each of these rigorously situated buildings, a light is scouring the depths, a light that has not yet been turned off or that has already been lit.
This really is the "subject" of photography, its punctum, which denotes the wounding, personally touching detail which establishes a direct relationship with the object or person within it. Asking about our relationship with light - and hence also photography. Telling of our hoped and fears, bringing out the fact that but for the existence of light the world would not exist before our eyes. And in each image instilling an enigmatic form.
"Anxiety and the danger of shadows mixed in with safety and well-being"
In each of these lived-in landscapes, for each of these rigorously situated buildings, a light is scouring the depths, a light that has not yet been turned off or that has already been lit.
This really is the "subject" of photography, its punctum, which denotes the wounding, personally touching detail which establishes a direct relationship with the object or person within it. Asking about our relationship with light - and hence also photography. Telling of our hoped and fears, bringing out the fact that but for the existence of light the world would not exist before our eyes. And in each image instilling an enigmatic form.
"Anxiety and the danger of shadows mixed in with safety and well-being"
Christian Caujolle, founder and artistic director of the French photo agency, Agence VU
