Raimond Wouds - Polder Viii, Tuindorp Oostzaan
On the 13th of October I went to the FOTODOK Book Club #26 with a teacher and some classmates of mine. Here we watched four artists and their new photobook. Raimond really stood out to me. In the book there are pictures from old archives and some of which are his own. This works really well with the subjects in the book, giving that some of the picture are very old black and white pictures it jut works well with telling older stories. The lay-out of the book is quite random to me, sometimes it switches from picturses dating from 1920 to pictures taken in 2019. I think this is because there is a really big story to tell and the texts in between the pictures really help explain the story of Tuindorp better. The cover is super simple and there is a flower on the front of the book. Unfortunately there are no high quality pictures of the cover online so I slipped in some picture I took on my phone. I think the cover is super simple because of the fact that Raimond want to focus on Tuindorp and not the cover or anything else. Especially his digital color work stood out to me. Here he combines some reallt creative compositions with great lighting which result in quite a "flat" photo, meaning without much light contrast. This is something I have seen before with other artists and it reallt speaks to me. I think this is because there is not as much emotion in a flat picture. This works out great for a book like mister Wouds did. Like I said earlier it's a mix of picture from old archives and his own pictures and it documents a neighbourhood in Amsterdam called Tuindorp. In the book the last 100 years are shown through pictures. This was also my first photobook I bought myself actually. I think this book will stay with me for quite a while. Giving me inspiration, a story to read and great pictures to look at. It really is a documentary that inspired me combining all of the above.
