honorable mention
Francis Meslet france
title
Sweet Hug Under Morning Light
I also have a memory of the 30 cts my mother used to give me for the collection which stayed in my pocket every Sunday to save up for the 3.50 Francs to buy a toy “Matchbox” car at the local tobacconists’ on the road to the house. It makes me sad but also gives me a wry smile that over the years I regularly measured my faith by admiring the little collection of cars I built up over the years. Enough to fill the entire drawer of a chest of drawers. Today it is with a free spirit and without any constraints that I enter by the door or window of an abandoned church to admire the light and take some pictures.
I sometimes feel guilty but only when I think to myself that I probably was not the only child to keep the collection money to buy a toy given
the state the church is in now.
Like time capsules, testifying to a parallel world and perfect for enabling the mind to wander and ponder, Francis Meslet?s melancholic images brave the passage of time, making way for silence after the memories left behind by human inhabitation. In these deserted places, no more than the rustling of the wind can be heard through a broken window or the sound of water dripping from a dilapidated ceiling. These silences nonetheless invite the spectator to slip into these well-guarded and mysterious places captured by the photographer and attempt to bring to life that which has been forgotten.
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entry description
Decades went by before I felt the need to enter a church again. Not that I have any bad memories of them, in fact my memories were pretty good and could be summed up in interminable laughter between friends during the Sunday mass under the red nose of the priest who had placed us there to keep an equally red eye on us. Once the service was over, we used to sneak off without a word to escape a second, rather less amusing sermon.I also have a memory of the 30 cts my mother used to give me for the collection which stayed in my pocket every Sunday to save up for the 3.50 Francs to buy a toy “Matchbox” car at the local tobacconists’ on the road to the house. It makes me sad but also gives me a wry smile that over the years I regularly measured my faith by admiring the little collection of cars I built up over the years. Enough to fill the entire drawer of a chest of drawers. Today it is with a free spirit and without any constraints that I enter by the door or window of an abandoned church to admire the light and take some pictures.
I sometimes feel guilty but only when I think to myself that I probably was not the only child to keep the collection money to buy a toy given
the state the church is in now.
about the photographer
A graduate in Design from the École des Beaux-Arts de Nancy in 1986, early in his career Francis Meslet was a designer, but soon turned to advertising when he joined several advertising agencies as an artistic director. After 30 years spent questioning the creative concept and studying images in all his compositions, he is now a creative director. Francis Meslet wears several hats; he is notably a renowned photographer who does not hesitate to roam the world in his spare time, searching for abandoned sites, sanctuaries where time seems to have stopped after humans have evacuated them. He thus brings back captivating and melancholic images of his travels to the other side of the world.Like time capsules, testifying to a parallel world and perfect for enabling the mind to wander and ponder, Francis Meslet?s melancholic images brave the passage of time, making way for silence after the memories left behind by human inhabitation. In these deserted places, no more than the rustling of the wind can be heard through a broken window or the sound of water dripping from a dilapidated ceiling. These silences nonetheless invite the spectator to slip into these well-guarded and mysterious places captured by the photographer and attempt to bring to life that which has been forgotten.
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