Protectorate
Why a book and an exposure on a forest which, with the dires of good number of tourists, is made up only of pines all identical the ones to the others? Testimonys of certain visitors who cross the main forest too hastily landais follow themselves and resemble. The qualifiers there are often found: monotony, repetition, uniformity.
And yet people who know this disproportionate extent well (approximately 1.166.000 hectares) are not agreement. Attentive walkers, - contemplative or hunters - which practice this forest use other words to qualify this single environment in Europe: Beauty, diversity, delicacy, harmony and richness.
But also the imprudent flanor can discover a dangerous and underhand nature.
Indeed the doubt settles quickly when you traverse hours during the fire walls
large Moors without seeing habitats or hearts which live. One should not be claustrophobic
when the horizon is stopped of all with dimensions ones, when the pines, dark and worrying girdle you and make stopping with the light.
This strange and miserly forest of sensational can also become threatening…
With the wire of these long ballades which have rates/rhythms these five last years, I let my glance be accustomed with this vegetation creates and managed by the man. The apparent regularity of the Gascon flora (the forest of Gascogne is populated with
80% of maritime pines and with 10% of oaks) required an special attention, increasingly acute of me nothing to miss by the spectacle.
Deliberately I was interested in the vegetable life giving up fauna with the animalist photographers. I sought the beauty hidden behind these maritime pines so much invading that they became arrogant about it. This tree, present since unmemorable times in this area extends now - by the will of the man - on nearly the three quarters to the surface to the department to the Moors.
This coniferous tree which changed the climate of the area and drained the moors marshy and unhealthy, which stabilized the sandy ground and finally made disappear the diseases devastating all the area - as paludism, remained been unaware of a long time for its intrinsic beauty. Created to be useful and to serve the man, the forest landaise remained, though forming the largest main forest of Europe, an unobtrusive and modest forest. It is revealed only with that which spends time with it, which remains vigilant and attentive. And which remains to him faithful. Through patience, the plastic color and it appeared in my photographs.
This vegetable inheritance become “nature-refuge” for many creators - Bernard Manciet, Jean Echenoz, Lydie Arrickx and much of others are impregnated - became essential even essential to me as well in my daily life as in my artistic projects and my choices. The influence of this vegetable habitat on my way of apprehending the rural world proved to be determining.
The forest was transformed into shelter where one forgets the daily newspaper to stick to the magnificence of the place. A refuge where the vegetation, under the crook of the man, seeks his autonomy, its independence. A place which protects you from the outside world.
The forest, placed under human “protectorate”, saw its life. It found a rate/rhythm and
a spiritual force which is clean for him.
Overcoming the climatic risks (storm of 1976, freezing of 1985), the attacks parasitic (insects and mushrooms) and especially the fires (of 1940 to 1950,400 000 hectares burned), nature - as a species of skin - looks after its wounds and is reconstituted each time.
Not rancorous, the pine which offers its wood, its resin and its elegance. As a dandy in evil of recognition it multiplies ad infinitum, leaving little place to the oaks and the corn fields that it côtoie.
The forest is concerned of its reception and its health: it obtained thousands of hectares of fire wall. Thanks to these sand and ground avenues the flanor can easily saunter then to be inserted in an accessible forest, and to look at, reflect, take photographs…
My images try, through a glance under influence, to make share a tinted graphic environment of odors and noises.
The forest landaise, a such megalopolis which breathes, locks up in a swirl of feelings and emotions that which ventures on its grounds. It is atypical, like all the forests, but it has three assets: it is my forest, it is largest of Europe… and it is most beautiful… I tried to testify to it splendor and it will be henceforth difficult for me to photograph another of them…
Jean Hincker, 2007
Why a book and an exposure on a forest which, with the dires of good number of tourists, is made up only of pines all identical the ones to the others? Testimonys of certain visitors who cross the main forest too hastily landais follow themselves and resemble. The qualifiers there are often found: monotony, repetition, uniformity.
And yet people who know this disproportionate extent well (approximately 1.166.000 hectares) are not agreement. Attentive walkers, - contemplative or hunters - which practice this forest use other words to qualify this single environment in Europe: Beauty, diversity, delicacy, harmony and richness.
But also the imprudent flanor can discover a dangerous and underhand nature.
Indeed the doubt settles quickly when you traverse hours during the fire walls
large Moors without seeing habitats or hearts which live. One should not be claustrophobic
when the horizon is stopped of all with dimensions ones, when the pines, dark and worrying girdle you and make stopping with the light.
This strange and miserly forest of sensational can also become threatening…
With the wire of these long ballades which have rates/rhythms these five last years, I let my glance be accustomed with this vegetation creates and managed by the man. The apparent regularity of the Gascon flora (the forest of Gascogne is populated with
80% of maritime pines and with 10% of oaks) required an special attention, increasingly acute of me nothing to miss by the spectacle.
Deliberately I was interested in the vegetable life giving up fauna with the animalist photographers. I sought the beauty hidden behind these maritime pines so much invading that they became arrogant about it. This tree, present since unmemorable times in this area extends now - by the will of the man - on nearly the three quarters to the surface to the department to the Moors.
This coniferous tree which changed the climate of the area and drained the moors marshy and unhealthy, which stabilized the sandy ground and finally made disappear the diseases devastating all the area - as paludism, remained been unaware of a long time for its intrinsic beauty. Created to be useful and to serve the man, the forest landaise remained, though forming the largest main forest of Europe, an unobtrusive and modest forest. It is revealed only with that which spends time with it, which remains vigilant and attentive. And which remains to him faithful. Through patience, the plastic color and it appeared in my photographs.
This vegetable inheritance become “nature-refuge” for many creators - Bernard Manciet, Jean Echenoz, Lydie Arrickx and much of others are impregnated - became essential even essential to me as well in my daily life as in my artistic projects and my choices. The influence of this vegetable habitat on my way of apprehending the rural world proved to be determining.
The forest was transformed into shelter where one forgets the daily newspaper to stick to the magnificence of the place. A refuge where the vegetation, under the crook of the man, seeks his autonomy, its independence. A place which protects you from the outside world.
The forest, placed under human “protectorate”, saw its life. It found a rate/rhythm and
a spiritual force which is clean for him.
Overcoming the climatic risks (storm of 1976, freezing of 1985), the attacks parasitic (insects and mushrooms) and especially the fires (of 1940 to 1950,400 000 hectares burned), nature - as a species of skin - looks after its wounds and is reconstituted each time.
Not rancorous, the pine which offers its wood, its resin and its elegance. As a dandy in evil of recognition it multiplies ad infinitum, leaving little place to the oaks and the corn fields that it côtoie.
The forest is concerned of its reception and its health: it obtained thousands of hectares of fire wall. Thanks to these sand and ground avenues the flanor can easily saunter then to be inserted in an accessible forest, and to look at, reflect, take photographs…
My images try, through a glance under influence, to make share a tinted graphic environment of odors and noises.
The forest landaise, a such megalopolis which breathes, locks up in a swirl of feelings and emotions that which ventures on its grounds. It is atypical, like all the forests, but it has three assets: it is my forest, it is largest of Europe… and it is most beautiful… I tried to testify to it splendor and it will be henceforth difficult for me to photograph another of them…
Jean Hincker, 2007
