This Week In Photography Books – Miquel LLonch

by Jonathan Blaustein

It’s cold and grey outside. A wet wind whistles in from the West. Summer’s sultry sun is gone, taking with it the long, languid days. (And the afternoon-delight-style naps are gone as well.) Soon enough, my nose will freeze and my toes will cry as I cram them into my snow boots. Winter is long in the Rockies.

Fortunately, I have an antidote. I fire up the teleportation machine, as it needs a few minutes to warm up. (Don’t we all.) Then, I step inside the lexan booth, enter the encrypted security code, say a prayer, and push the button. Poof.

I emerge, almost immediately, in a purple/yellow/green field. Trees sway gently in the breeze, which carries whiffs of garlic shrimp, bitter coffee, and roasting peppers. It’s quiet; the grass soft beneath my feet. At first I am alone, at the edge of the woods. Intermittently, I am joined by passing wanderers: a man and his daughter, two young-ish boys heading deeper into a tryst, a pair of gypsy children.

The light needs a camera for proper description. The colors are not natural, but only because the remnants of sun’s castoff rays commingle with the light pollution at the margins of the city. Which city? On the shore of the Mediterranean Sea, I’m not sure it matters. The teleportation device’s range is notoriously broad, like a pre-smart Navy missile, so it could be any number of places.

If only.

Fortunately, with a 5 year old at home, I’m skilled at pretend. Today, I owe my lingering daydream to a quiet, little soft-cover book, “In the fields of gold,” by Miquel LLonch. It was recently published by Poursuite, with support from the cultural board of Terrassa.

The book is slim and delicate, but not in the kind of way that makes you worry about ruining it. The inside flap has a short statement, in French and English, explaining that the artist is a child of the Mediterranean, and hopes to live and die there like his forebears. Keep the integrity of the tribe and all.

Then, we’re right into the photographs, remnants of twilight walks at the edge of the city, which remains unnamed. As I’ve said before, if an artist wants you to know something, he/she will give you that contextual information. So here, clearly, the exact locale was unnecessary. I’m guessing Barcelona. The book has Spanish thank you section, and the artist’s name seems Catalan to me.

As to the photographs, there are exquisite landscapes mixed in with dreamy portraits of the aforementioned passers by. The people shots are nice, but it’s the landscape images that sit in my brain still. Wow, are they lovely. Mystery without menace is a difficult balance.

Are the colors real? Silly question in 2012. Everything’s subjective, whether your picture is massaged in camera via settings, in a web app via filters, or back in Old School Photoshop via color correction. The more appropriate question might be are the colors expressive? Claro que si.

Sadly, I have to give these books back. My little sojourns are temporary, and then the pictures live in my head. In this case, I’m ambivalent. Sure, I’d keep it if I could, but it’s not necessary. I can taste the salt on my tongue, feel the next-day sun on my cheeks, and relish the hangover churro as it slides down my gullet into a grumbling stomach.

Bottom Line: Pretty twilight landscapes, perfect for September

To purchase “In the fields of gold” visit Photo-Eye

Full Disclosure: Books are provided by Photo-Eye in exchange for links back for purchase.

Books are found in the bookstore and submissions are not accepted.