By Suzanne Révy
After this cold, dark winter, I long to feel the warmth of the summer sun on my skin. Following an interminable confinement, I yearn for reconnection with my far-flung family and close circle of friends. In anxious anticipation of normalcy, I have busied myself making photographs and reading photography books. Two recently published books, Knit Club by Carolyn Drake and In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky feed my visceral need for mild weather and human connection with their rich, earthy palettes, warm light and penetrating portraits of both people and nature.
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
Carolyn Drake’s Knit Club opens with an unnerving portrait of a figure whose face is obscured by a plaster of Paris mask, but then segues to images that reveal structures overrun by nature. The abandonment of a once elegant home is expressed in the frayed curtain and rotting sill of an open window intertwined with weeds. In her quiet compositions, Drake captures the languorous tone of Faulkner’s south in the small, northern Mississippi town of Water Valley. Hers is a journey searching the mysteries of a place, but not of a time.
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
While a former resident, Drake had struggled to unveil the town photographically, but it was not until after she moved away and returned to visit that a friend invited her into an inner circle of knitters. Evoking Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying, short written passages and quotes titled “Sticks and Leaves” by Rebecca Bengal invite readers to eavesdrop on the ups and downs of relationships, marriages, break-ups and parenting in Water Valley. Now privy to their gatherings and gossip, Drake peels away the masks that had obscured her earlier view, exposing an effortless inertia and the endless intrigues of the small town, observed with an outsider’s eyes – as a woman without a child.
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
Drake’s landscapes, interiors and portraits ooze with torpid atmospheric stasis and a timelessness bathed in generational memory. In a gracious southern spread featuring a ring of deviled eggs, both virtue and sin are being served. Intertwining forces of history and identity are conveyed figuratively by a mother and child concealed behind a large 19th century painting or in faces emerging from deep shadows. Metaphorically, this theme is repeated in the vines and weeds that strangle an ancient, towering tree. The biblical overtones of temptation and knowledge weave through the pictures, particularly in one featuring a large albino snake slithering toward the sneaker of a child in a tree. Drake interprets and reinterprets the myth of this place through her deft sequencing, closing with a portrait of another masked woman who embraces her child in an obvious homage to a pietà. Through rich color and dramatic late afternoon light, Drake’s deeply satisfying magical realism expresses a singular sense of place, cloaked in the lush landscape and sultry ambiance of Faulkner’s Mississippi.
From the book Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
Scenes of urban nature are similarly palpable in Irina Rozovsky’s In Plain Air. Unlike Drake’s constructed fictions, Rozovsky wanders through the wilderness of Brooklyn’s Prospect Park observing the diversity of individuals and groups basking in a seemingly borderless paradise. Her approach may be rooted in the documentary, but her presentation accentuates elements of theater including an overture, actors, and dramatic sets.
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
Rozovsky opens the book with a dynamic series of four pictures leading to the title page, then follows with a more languid pace using ethereal, late day light, the juxtaposition of seasons and expressive interactions between trees and humans. Her adroit sequencing reveals an assortment of personal interactions in this vast urban park. In one early spread, trees wearing lacy tendrils of freshly fallen snow are visited by a sole dog. On the facing page, a waterside canopy of trees in soft springtime mist hosts a trio of Indian women fishing. The pop of an orange sari pricks the simple drama between two seasonal pictures. In another spread, the graceful neck of a swan is mirrored in a corkscrew-shaped tree trunk and the twisting gesture of a women reaching for a man sitting in it. The parallel is gracefully drawn, while raising questions around privacy and voyeurism.
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
The book is dedicated to the designer of the park, Frederick Law Olmsted, but the pictures do not describe his designs so much as emphasize how the meadows, paths and ponds encourage a spiritual respite for city dwellers in both public areas and private corners. In an unmistakably man-made oasis – neither formal nor untamed – Rozovsky gets blessedly lost among the weeds. Her pictures transform the park into an idyllic realm where trivial and grand narratives play out on the page. The simple acts of smoking, dancing in the foliage, lying in the sun or making a family snapshot are as sacred as the kiss between a bride and groom. Raising the curtain on this Garden of Eden, Rozovsky gently summons us to emerge from the isolation of the past year into the embrace of this pastoral public sphere— to revel in nature and carefully reconnect with community.
From the book In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK Books, 2021 (book photographed by Suzanne Révy)
To purchase:
Knit Club by Carolyn Drake
with “Sticks and Leaves” by Rebecca Bengal
TBW Books, 2020
https://tbwbooks.com/products/knit-club
In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky
MACK Books, 2021
https://mackbooks.co.uk/collections/frontpage/products/in-plain-air-br-irina-rozovsky
(Featured Image) In Plain Air by Irina Rozovsky, MACK 2021, (left) and Knit Club by Carolyn Drake, TBW Books, 2020 (books photographed by Suzanne Révy)
Share On Facebook
Tweet It
