CAIRO: With a fleeting first glance you see a faded azure landscape, vast and desolate. Then, slowly – as the images seem to come closer, even as you stand still – you glimpse a small image on the horizon, where the sky meets the sea two people stand in the still waters.
Part of a photography exhibit entitled “Horizons by Frenchman Jérôme Tisné’s, the image draws you in with a powerful magnetism.
Having amassed his experience as a photographer and director in the fields of fashion and advertising, this is the first collection of his personal work that he captured during his travels in Africa from 2002 to 2004, where he journeyed from Namibia to Mali, Egypt to South Africa.
Featuring a series of landscapes, the images capture the vastness of space and time, as the horizon separates sky from terrain in an eternal divide. Nature and man seem diminutive and transient in comparison.
“It becomes a shock, a visual shock, but also a shock of greatness of infinite solitude and infinite aloneness. I sometimes encounter these impressions in the desert, by the sea, in gigantic, empty spaces where occasionally man leaves a trace or a trail, Tisné writes about his collection. The muted colors and overexposed light only help the photographer accentuate the solitude. However, as opposed to being intimidating, the composition of the images relay calming serenity. The cool colors blend together in harmony, merging at the skyline. From the still landscape, ethereal images appear, and though they seem insignificant within the great spaces, they are intriguing.
Tisné’s photography is an alluring study of light and space. Even while capturing the more traditional images, such as Snefru’s Bent Pyramid, he manages to make a statement about the relationship between space and time. The pyramid emerges from the sandy sky and the desert like a ghost from the past, grand yet fading in its glory.
Tisné’s work transcends the simplicity of his style. His images are both captivating and evocative.
“Horizons photography exhibition will run until Saturday, June 10 at Safar Khan Gallery, 6 Brazil St., Zamalek, Cairo. Mondays through Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:00 to 9:00 p.m. Tel: 735 3314
