Photobooks of 2017: Gabriela Cendoya
I’ve bought less books this year, but this list is still filled with books from my collection. Of course, there has been great “ Classic” re-editions this year that I am sure you haven’t missed! This is just some of my favorites.
Rafal Milach – The First March of Gentlemen
Rafal Milach’s photocollages remind me of Constructivism experiments, but his beautiful book is also clever and profound, as well as historically meaningful. A great work both in design and in content.
Laura El Tantawy – Beyond Here Is Nothing
Another self-published book. Meditative, Laura’s book is a visual diary, looking for a sense of belonging, a search for a place to call home. Small and beautiful like a jewel box, one you never leave behind.
Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs – Continental Drift
You don’t want to miss this one! Onorato &Krebs go East, and it’s a marvel for your eyes and brain. I cannot understand why that book wasn’t in all best books prizes of the year.
Maya Rochat – A Rock Is A River
The Swiss artist goes on with her astonishing photographic experiments, layers, mutations and ruptures of the conventional form. It’s hallucinating. If you can, go for the special edition, hand and spray painted for a deeper experience.
Alix Marie – Bleu
An extraordinary book-sculpture of the body, of the surface of the skin, by the french artist Alix Marie. You can feel the shivering through the pages, touch the bruises, examine the secrets. An amazing work.
Margot Wallard – Natten
A book about mourning and loss by another french photographer, Margot Wallard, a farewell song to her brother. A celebration of life too, amid the wild and the cold, between pain, the organic and the mineral. Stunning and beautiful.
Rabih Mroué – Diary of a Leap Year
The work of the Lebanese artist Rabih Mroué, a year long of cutouts and collages ( 366 ) of Lebanese or Arab newspapers dated between 2006 and 2016, is a reflection on representation of violence in the Arab world. Published on the occasion of an exhibition in Kunsthalle Mainz, it is both a very delicate and strong work.
Bryan Schutmaat – Good Goddamn
The new book by Bryan Schutmaat is a short black and white story of the last days of freedom of his friend in rural Texas. Shot a few days before he’s going to prison, it is a sad, lonely, evocative and beautiful work.
I cannot help but mention:
Andrés Medina – Río
Andrés’ project has been on my wishlist for 2 or 3 years, before it finally has been published. The book is a meditative walk near the edges of the Tagus river in Spain, connecting with the landscape. Andrés catches up with himself along the way, taking us on a poetic and beautiful ride.
This one has just arrived and is my number one of the year!
Raymond Meeks (with Chris Pickett) – Furlong: Halfstory Halflife
Raymond Meeks’ handmade books are an absolute beauty, and this one is a new treasure. Furlong series are a wonderful and sensitive description of the end of childhood among nature( and much more ), and Meeks’ photographies have the power to make me cry… Expensive but you will not regret it.
I wish i could go on, i find it so hard to do a short list…
Gabriela Cendoya is a Spanish photobook collector, living in the Basque Country.
Images: top, Rafal Milach – The First March of Gentlemen, below, Laura El-Tantawy – Beyond Here Is Nothing, Raymond Meeks – Furlong: Halfstory Halflife
