Project Detail: The four seasons of the fisherman

Contest:

LuganoPhotoDays 2015 Open



Brand:

LuganoPhotoDays



Author:

Philippe Herren

Status:
Selected

 

Project Info

The four seasons of the fisherman

The twelve photographs I am submitting to LUGANOPHOTODAYS2015 tell of the four seasons of fishing on Lake Geneva through my frequent and regular encounters, during nearly a year, with a young professional fisherman, Julien Monney, established in Hermance, near Geneva.
This report, prepared between March 2014 and January 2015, draws attention to the work, and especially to the passion, for a challenging métier that offers the public a local product obtained under artisanal conditions, respecting the rhythms of nature. What do they tell, these photographs? Here, I will focus on four of my “discoveries”. First of all, the physical effort of the fisherman, particularly during the laying and withdrawal of fishing nets, when his gestures compose a startling, at times acrobatic, choreography, especially when fishing with loop nets that must be lifted, submerged and moved around, a difficult task due to the small size of the boat hull.
Secondly, the manual work, essential to all fishing activities. The scalpel framing of photography reveals the minutiae of finger motions, the accuracy of their work, the finesse and plastic beauty of their movements.
Above all, I shared with Julien the day’s incertitude: the inconstant weather, for example, with mornings of frost and snow that render difficult, almost impossible, any movement on the boat. I also witnessed the unpredictability of the catch, the precariousness of income, the weariness, after working seven days a week from dawn to dusk during a whole year, with only the meager, necessary vacations. All around is incertitude, expectation or hope.
Finally, I discovered the magic spell of the lake. Nowhere else but there, in Julien’s company, have I come in contact with this unvarying expanse of water that seems to have been placed deep below the rest of the world. In the isolation of this lacustrine elsewhere arises the proud independence of the fisherman and his day-to-day and expected rendezvous with himself.
At the end of my association with Julien I wanted to know more about his hopes and perhaps also about his dreams. He gave me a peremptory response: “I don’t want to answer because I am afraid of losing this magic.”
Julien refers me to the task for which I have joined him. Isn’t it my role to discover this enchantment and reveal it to others through photography? Where does it come from, this magic that oozes from the fisher’s fingers during the artistic work of his hands? From his thirst for the lake or from his hand-to-hand struggle with this nature that gives him all or takes all? From the blood on the fishery’s workbench? From the cold market appreciation of his products? From the precarious stability of the days, never the same, rendering the future very uncertain, but also covering it with hope and confidence?
In conclusion, couldn’t perhaps this life of the fisherman represent the wavering thread of the human condition, full of pride and arrogance, recluse in the narrow territory where it exercises its power, as if waiting for an exchange of experiences through the medium of photography?

Photos