WERNER VAN RECK

“Water is poetry. Sometimes hard and sharp, other times soft and elegant. A perpetual motion of attraction and withdrawal, a flirtatious waterline always balancing with its inseparable companion: the land. With a fascinated gaze, I’m wondering what it does to people. Beaches and shores that seem to offer people time, needed to come to themselves. I want to immortalise their moments of reflections. Reflections that create subdued emotions, bring cheerful relation to life or evoke melancholy memories.

I work alone and quietly, with the rushing of the water in the background. All photos are photographed with Polaroid instant film. The images gain a poetic power from the dreamy blur and the fading colours and contrasts, unique to this film process. And I love it.”

Werner Van Reck (1959, Antwerp) studied art direction and photography at the Academy for Fine Arts in Antwerp. Werner works in both communications and photography. Many of his photo reportages have been published in magazines. He shot a serie of images in Africa for Baobab, a Senegalese organization, in support of a fundraising initiative. From 2006 to 2008, he portrayed hundreds of citizens of Antwerp for his book ‚Stadsmussen’ (‚City Dwellers’), a project commissioned by the City of Antwerp.