Summary

The work presented here is the outcome of a search which can be conveniently described as two-directional: backward, through the maze of my memory, and forward, through the perplexity of the visual around us. Going back to my childhood memories, I have tried to establish which images had attracted my attention and ever since subliminally informed my visual language. These discoveries were then used in the process of analysing, understanding and purifying my photographic statements, which in turn enabled me to go even deeper into the well of my memory. Quite often, this bilateral process was carried out on the subconscious level.

The tree-lined canals of Belgium had been a major, easy-to-detect influence in my early days , until I discovered by chance the far-reaching effect of a brochure for a regional landmark, [images-1]  the canal-lock of Ronquieres. Both the edifice and the brochure decisively moulded my visual formation. This has been finally confirmed by the similarity of  [images-2]  two pairs of recently taken photographs. One was from the Belgian canal-lock, and the other from Egypt. Otherwise, another big source of ‘haunting’ images was an Encyclopedia from the 1960’s with its b&w photos of  [images-3]  towns, and the b&w reproduction of De Chirico’s ‘The Enigma of the Day’.

In the context of my photographic statements, it was all set in motion by this photograph  [images-4]  taken, as I believed then, for compositional reasons only. Two years later, I moved on by attaching a story, although only after completing the visual part  [images-5]  of the project. Another step forward, and my next work  [images-6]  was symbolic and premeditated, except that I might have, in the first place, drawn the inspiration for the narrative from the very landscape I would photograph later. This project dealt with a paradox of life according to which it seems that our lives are rarely so intense as when we get very close to its opposite - death. The wasteland in the pictures present hardship. The sea is the process of death, attractive (in face of adversity) from distance but repulsive as soon as we touch the cold water (the threshold of death), and the sky is (the aftermath of) death, and the origin of the real attraction death may hold for us.

Made in a different vein, and in-between the above two projects was  [images-7]  Lot, Bruxelles, where I shifted towards a more radical subject matter, in terms of uneventfulness. This feature was then used together with the background (literally and metaphorically) of the Newhaven photographs to create  [images-8]  Seaford, East Sussex. This mixture had a curious outcome. Mystery, conveyed by the remnants of a wall, was superior to the idea of the paradox in life. or life itself, which was conveyed by the surrounding space.

Having been seriously stuck for a couple of years I again had to thank good fortune for the next and, as it eventually turned out, the pivotal and central series in this monograph. This image  [images-9]  served as trigger. The effect was not immediate as it took my mind two years to digest it. And even then, I was a whisker away from missing the site that allowed me the creation of  [images-10]  Arrecife, Lanzarote, as I was just about to leave the island empty handed when I stumbled upon this place that came from beyond my dreams. Something that never remotely crossed my conscious mind. I could not but feel blessed. These photographs crowned the scheme that had been initiated over twenty years ago when I saw the  [images-1a]  Ronquieres complex for the first time.

At this point, however, things slowly started turning sour as I soon enough realized that two  [images-11]  images, and only two, were left over as outstanding after a critical survey of my work carried out on my return from a revelational journey to Egypt. The ‘Temple’ project seemed to have reached its limits, and the essence had evaded me again, allowing me to get hold just of its traces. Especially disheartening was my dependence on sheer luck or providence should I wish to enlarge this preciously small collection. There is still, of course, the possibility of another substantial breakthrough, but that seems to be my only reasonable hope, however slim.