Fièvre by Lorenzo Castore is a slight wormhole of a photobook. One starts appreciating it through one side of the vacuum and comes out the other side, thinking through it differently. That is not to suggest that it is not consistent; it is. With Castore, I am accustomed to the romantic nature of his photographs. I think of his work as being tinged with desire, sex, and the body. When I suggest romantic, I do not mean it is without an edge or a darkness. That darkness is implicit in the romanticism I think of. What separates Castore from other planets in the dissolving orbit in which he travels is the presence of Castore himself, not as an actor within the tableaux but as someone who has been let in to participate. However, he does surface (I think) throughout. Where I was challenged was feeling the body, mostly female, was central to the. In the end, I feel it is the author.
With this romantic type of photography (not a pejorative usage), much of it comes from what appears as a state of loss at who we are, loss at being human, loss at love, etc. In these photographs, an auteur is seeking. What they seek is not entirely defined as doing so would limit what they desire and make it cavalier, every day, or … normal. Castore is a seeker. His images are melancholic, and we often assume that melancholy comes from dissatisfaction or sadness. Still, in reality, melancholy is understanding the two worlds in which the human condition stands: love and death, joy and loss. In this world, to stagnate or to remain indecisive is the only real fear. Movement is air and sustainability.
This reminds me that transience, or lack of rootedness, often pursues an artist. Whereas it is not necessarily clear where Lorenzo makes his photographs, one gathers a sense of roaming, an ephemerality in his movements. Dislocation, therefore, may be part of what makes his photographs essential to his experience and vice versa. He seeks other people for temporary mooring and then continues on a path, however fuzzy it is at the edges. The only suggestion of rootedness comes from the photographs of children, which may or may not be (I have no idea) familial. They suggest persistence, depending on the condition of the relationship between the author and the subject.
Lorenzo’s photography, for me, is not meant to be contemporary, so let that simmer before burning. I see the work instead as something from the 20th Century. I mean this because I am also a product of this time and have fond memories of it. Without trying to self-damage too far, I wish we could go back. Everything now is bland, overthought, without emotion. When I think of Christer Strömholm, Robert Frank, Jane Evelyn Atwood, Masahisa Fukase, and others in the same orbit, I return to what people in the age group of myself, Lorenzo, Oliver Pin-Fat, Laura Rodari, Anders Petersen, Michael Ackerman, and others remember. It was a time before anxiety crippled the spirit, tore the root out of existence and anonymity, and provided us with a less sheltered, microscopic and anti-bacterial world. It was close enough to the Great War, and the decay and death clung to the air, even from an American perspective. And now, what?
I mention this as I see it all in Lorenzo’s work, whether intentional or not. I do not suggest that his efforts are retrograde. However, he, amongst others, is from a core group of artists who still remember something different, existential, and closer to the bone, and it surfaces deeply in the work. It is caught in the malaise of bodies, intertwined and palpitating. It is caught in the chamber of film grain, the dissolution of light-made material essence, and finally, it is caught in the overall picture of the artist himself. The desire he has accumulated is very much held in a different proximity than what I had bundled with my preconceived notions of his work and instead I find it caught in the obtuse gray amber of his fleeting reflection.
I know that I struggle between centuries when I look at Castore’s work. I understand why I doubt everything and how it crushes my spirit into bone meal. If anything, I hope that Castore may keep this spirit alive. Whereas it is dangerous to dwell in the past, extinguishing it is significantly worse. The book is a reminder, not a token, that cruder, yet more essential form exists.