Click on the photo above for some spreads of the book.
My photo book Falling Man has been published in january 2022 in a beautiful design by Sybren Kuiper. You can purchase copies via Scheltema Bookstore and Premsela, both in Amsterdam, or via this website. The price is 35 euros. Bookstores: please send me a message for a special agreement. Size: 24 x 28 cm / 9 x 11 inches. Pages: 124. Edition: 500. The book received a wonderful 4****STAR review by Arno Haijtema of Dutch national newspaper De Volkskrant and an international prize: The Prix de la Photographie Paris - Art Books - SILVER
FALLING MAN
In the book I combine three themes which, to my mind, came together in the early stage of the Corona crisis in 2020: death, sex and religion. Freud tangled together Eros and Thanatos: sex (or: life force) and death. I added a third transcendental dimension: religion.
Beginning in mid-March 2020, just after the Prime Minister of the Netherlands had announced the lockdown and the ‘new normal’ of the 1.5 meter social distance rule, I started visiting cemeteries and strolling for hours through the Red Light District (De Wallen) in Amsterdam, with my analog Rolleiflex in hand. The usually overcrowded area felt dystopian and deserted. Touching one another was not allowed, sex was on hold and churches closed down. I sensed the fear of death everywhere, as if life itself had been expelled.
The photographs taken at cemeteries, churches and the Red Light District, combined with the portraits I’ve been taking of family and friends with their eyes closed while contemplating their mortality - the Memento Mori portraits - form the content of my new photo book Falling Man.
"Because I could not stop for Death, He kindly stopped for me. The carriage held but just ourselves and Immortality" - Emily Dickinson
The handmade leporello gives an impression of my visits to Iraqi Kurdistan in 2017-2018 and my encounters with female Peshmerga fighters. In their hands they carry souvenirs of loved ones. The leporello is fully handmade, handwritten and handprinted in my own dark room. Each copy unique. Not 'just' a book but a true piece of art, containing 30 photographs, in a limited edition of 25. Only one copy left! Price is 295 euros. Read the wonderful and insightful review by Sabrina Mandanici of Collector Daily HERE
What does a face tell you? Can you tell if somebody has changed by looking at his expression? I photographed the Marines of the 13th infantry company of the Royal Netherlands Marine Corps, before, during and after their deployment in Uruzgan. Young men, full of excitement and expectations being sent to a warzone. Has the experience changed them? Can we tell by looking?
Regular copies of Here Are The Young Men are sold out. The Special Edition comes with a print on Hahnemuhle Fine Art Paper: 'Marine Wilbert asleep at Cop Tabar', edition 50, only 2 copies left. Price: 195 euros.
Op een nacht gebeurt er iets eigenaardigs in het Rijksmuseum. Het meisje van De Nachtwacht maakt zich los uit de verf en stapt zomaar uit het doek. Ze wil weten wie haar maker was. Wie heeft haar zo mooi geschilderd dat miljoenen mensen uit de hele wereld naar haar komen kijken? Op haar ontdekkingstocht ontmoet ze kunstenaar Jan Wolkers, een grote fan van Rembrandt. Samen praten ze over de schilder die ze zo bewonderen: hoe goed hij naar mensen keek, hoe levensecht hij tekende en schilderde, en hoe bijzonder het meisje zelf is: 'een vlinder tussen de torren".
Kinderboek met foto's. Uitgeverij: Leopold, Amsterdam, 2007. Mede tot stand gekomen dankzij een subsidie van de stichting Nederlands Literair Productie en Vertalingenfonds. Met dank aan Jan Wolkers voor zijn fantastische medewerking en Els Barents, voormalig directeur Huis Marseille, Museum voor Fotografie.
*Uitverkocht
The book Only The Sky Remains Untouched is the finalization of a photo reportage, in which I portrayed fifteen war veterans in a dilapidated weapons factory at the Hembrug site in Zaandam. The place is a symbol of the suffering of former soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Price is 30 euros.
A book about the lockdowns containing interviews with various people from 'the field'. Such as Rob Elens; doctor, Isa Kriens; lawyer, Arno Wellens; financial journalist, George van Houts; actor, Sander Compagner; publisher Andere Krant. Text and interviews: Arndt Strodinck, photography: Claire Felicie and a foreword by Sven Hulleman: initiator and publisher.
