Pierre Faure, Burning Fields

Pierre Faure, Burning Fields, 2009

I met Pierre Faure wandering around the labyrinth of Paris Photo last November and have since been meaning to post about a series of work in progress that he showed me at the time. The series, entitled Burning Fields, is a study of the limits of light in urban areas. Faure drives to the edge of towns or cities until the light begins to dwindle sufficiently. This is a complicated and time-consuming process as the pictures look nothing like what the naked eye would see (on close inspection of some of these images you can see stars piercing through the orange hue of the sky). I found this idea of photographing the frontiers of light fascinating: a reinterpretation of the concept of ‘city limits’. The images have a certain ominous quality that is compounded by the title of the series which resonates with the expression ‘burnt field’ used to refer to the landscapes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki following the atomic bombings. These could be images of the sun rising too close to Earth or of a massive fire engulfing a city. Faure has also published an excellent photobook on Japan from a series of images taken during his residency at the Villa Kujoyama. Hopefully Burning Fields will make it into book form before too long.

Related posts:

1. Hiroshi Sugimoto: Lightning fields
2. Christophe Maout’s city of light