Editions de La Belle Étoile* are publishing this book by Riego van Wersch.
Here are some images accompanied by this text from the editor Stéphane Coutelle.
Riego van Wersch photographs as one paints, the gesture is paramount.
This gesture which invents clear fuzziness, which creates textures and materials.
The sea like fine linen,
The wave that throws up sparks of foam,
The ocean scratched like an engraving,
A navy sky like a crumpled tarp,
The calligraphies of light.
Riego van Wersch places light at the heart of the image, in keeping with a strong affiliation with the great masters of the 19th century.
His seascapes evoke the dark romanticism of Turner, with their dramatic skies, the power of the elements unleashed to the point of abstraction.
Riego is van Wersch an architect of the movement. His urban landscapes vibrate with ghostly brilliance. Its objective redraws the cities and their perspectives. The trains tear them apart. Cars slide or swarm. The crowds rustle. The skyscrapers fade away, the roofs flap their wings.
Riego van Wersch is a solitary traveler, who remains a discreet observer. He follows his anonymous characters rather than confronting them. At a respectful distance, he draws semi-transparent silhouettes, traversed by silent vibrations, like echoes of thoughts.
The paradox of the Riego van Wersch images is that through their very movement, he creates a space of immobility, a crack in space-time that offers the time to step back. In this, this journey that he invites us to share turns out to be a vibrant and inclusive experience.
Stéphane Coutelle
Riego van Wersch : Photography
160 pages, 75 pictures, 30x20cm.
From €55.00
The book also exists in a limited edition of twenty copies, accompanied by a signed and numbered print of La Coccinelle, 25×19 cm.
