Take time, calm down, observe…
Take time to lie down and dream, take time to make use of slow photography, take time out of time.
This work, as well as the other Ambrotypes series I’ve made, is a multi level paradox.
Images of dreamers and nature, nothing new, nothing sensational, just an intimate view of individuals in their solitude. Both this long process and the subjects are in opposition to a fast moving and easily bored world. A few glass plates against an endless flow of images. Pictures on noble material to be held in hands for more than a second. Long poses versus instant photography . Organic versus abstract.
All this contrasts with the modern era, and shows us how far we went, how excessive our lives can be.
What if classic romantic images of women and nature became sensational and rare?
If the process is not an end in itself, the user still takes a stand, almost political, by using it, a refusal of the speed of modern life that is.
Not only do I enjoy observing the depth in the eyes of a model focusing on her immobility, but I also see some sort of therapeutic method in this process, for the model as well as for the photographer
The day I moved out of cities in order to change my life, I naturally used more and more wet plate collodion to photograph a simpler life, still or not. It fits with a certain pace of life, its flaws and randomness illustrating perfectly an uneven, calm and lyrical environment.
Eric Antoine was born in 1974 and lives in Hangebieten -France
