The Cow and the Orchid
Timothy Prus
Archive of Modern Conflict and La Silueta Ediciones
English and Spanish
Hardcover
Edition of 500
204 pages
210 x 265 mm
2017
ISBN 9789588568638
“No one doubts Queen Victoria would have loved Colombia. She was known to suffer from orchid delirium and appointed an official Royal orchid expert whose name was Frederick Sanders. The Queen also had an enormous empathy for cows. Beautiful specimens graced the Royal herd and won many prizes. Sadly, there is nothing of Victoria or Fred in this exhibition, but we should have no regrets. The photos here were gathered during a 12-year journey through Colombia. No stone was left unturned in the search for truly generic photographs of this country. As the collection grew, a vision emerged that was once closer to Europe, and at the same time infinitely more mysterious than we could have imagined. Do they help us understand the territory more profoundly? Definitely not. It remains an enigma. Mixing the 19th-, 20th-, and 21st-centuries forced time to fold in on itself. Any clearer? Well, perhaps a trifle. The sensual orchid is one of Colombia’s national symbols. The cow, placid and generous, is a symbol of nothing. The place between the two – like photography – is ambiguous. And so we find a nation where image-making is pulsing like a fiesta in which we can all take part.”
– Timothy Prus
(Source: https://archiveofmodernconflict.com/the-cow-and-the-orchid-generic-colombian-photography-timothy-prus/)
About the Author
Timothy Prus (b. 1959) is an English visual artist and curator of the Archive of Modern Conflict since 1992. He is also an exhibition organiser and a photobook editor. His previous publications include The Whale’s Eyelash (2014), Nein, Onkle (2007), Scrapbook (2009), and The Corinthians (2008). Previous exhibitions include Lodz Ghetto (Muzeum Sztuki, 2005), Collected Shadows (Museum of Contemporary Art, Toronto, 2013), Notes Homes (FORMAT International Photography Festival, Derby, 2013), The Great Refusal (2013,) and A Guide to the Protection of the Public in Peacetime (Tate Modern, London, 2014).
(Source: https://www.rencontres-arles.com/en/commissaires/view/90/timothy-prus)
About the Publishers
The Archive of Modern Conflict is an organisation dedicated to collecting and preserving vernacular photographs, objects, artefacts, curiosities, and ephemera. Founded in 1991, the archive began as a collection of photographs relating to war and conflict but has since expanded its remit to become the vast and thematically diverse repository it is today. They have produced and published over thirty books, often collaborating with photographers and artists such as Stephen Gill, Cristina de Middel, Thomas Mailaender, Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin, and Don McCullin.
archiveofmodernconflict.com
(Source: https://archiveofmodernconflict.com/about-us/)
La Silueta is an independent publishing house and design studio. As a publishing house, it publishes art, photography, illustrated books, and graphic novels, among other works; it seeks to promote research, creation, and the visibility of its authors. The books are characterized by their careful production and their high value as objects.
http://www.lasilueta.com/
(Source: https://www.artbo.co/semanaartbo/Libro-de-artista/La-Silueta)
