Hraun II
SW Iceland, September & October 2017
Another two months in Iceland to finish working along the classical frontier epitomized by the slash in nature/culture, human/non-human.
That was trip #7 and I eventually came to terms with what is painful albeit obvious: the human agency is everywhere, even in Iceland. Yet the Icelandic tourist industry keeps selling the image of an unspoilt nature to millions of tourists.
In fact, with a steady 20-25% increase in the number of inbound visitors each year from here on, the thriving economy may well unleash unpleasant collateral damages on the landscape.
If in my previous series Hraun, I often bluntly photographed the slash, this time I brought heterogeneous elements together in the frame both from the near and the far, diminishing the immediate importance of the frontier by scattering it all over the place.
These images are meant to be printed large to suggest with greater depth and quality that the authoritarian slash is now flat gone.
Welcome in the new epistemological regime, one of composition, one in which we're far from being detached.
That was trip #7 and I eventually came to terms with what is painful albeit obvious: the human agency is everywhere, even in Iceland. Yet the Icelandic tourist industry keeps selling the image of an unspoilt nature to millions of tourists.
In fact, with a steady 20-25% increase in the number of inbound visitors each year from here on, the thriving economy may well unleash unpleasant collateral damages on the landscape.
If in my previous series Hraun, I often bluntly photographed the slash, this time I brought heterogeneous elements together in the frame both from the near and the far, diminishing the immediate importance of the frontier by scattering it all over the place.
These images are meant to be printed large to suggest with greater depth and quality that the authoritarian slash is now flat gone.
Welcome in the new epistemological regime, one of composition, one in which we're far from being detached.