Dirk Braeckman, Roma Publications, Amsterdam, 2011
250 × 290 mm - 384 pages, ISBN 978 90 77459 67 6

Editorial team / translations / image correction

Dirk Braeckman is one of Belgiums leading artistic photographers. In each of his monumental photographic works, he creates an enclosed, isolated world that appears endless in its tactility, while at the same time gives short shrift to the illusions of the medium. These images do not aim to convey anything and yet they are suggestive of complete narratives.
This Roma publication remains the most extensive publication of Dirk Braeckman’s work. As Braeckman explains in the introduction of the book: “(…) we discovered a large number of ‘new’ images – images that had never been printed. Detached from the context in which I had made them, they could be viewed anew and forge new connections. A number of these discoveries are included in this publication. From a physical perspective, they have yet to achieve definitive form. Ordinarily, the work exists first, and is published at a later date. Here, the reverse is true in some cases. Certain works exist only on the pages of this book, untitled, without dimensions – I may produce them as prints at some point in the future. This publication is, therefore, an autonomous instrument. It presents a state of affairs: extant and unprinted works, in whatever form, without conventional themes, periods or sequences. As such, this publication is a cross between an artist’s book and a survey publication. And I feel right at home with this synthesized form.”