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Hyperphotos B y
If bigger really is better, then Jean-François Rauzier’s photos must surely be the best. With file sizes that exceed 40 gigabytes, contain as many as 3.5 billion pixels and span print dimensions up to 150 feet, it is hard to imagine many images exceeding these in sheer size. But some would contend that size doesn’t matter—it is how you use it. To that end, Rauzier also uses his pixels very well, creating fascinating yet realistic alternative realities. Though Rauzier does not speak Eng-
L a r r y
B r o w n s t e i n
lish fluently, I learned an interesting word from him—oneiric. It means dreamlike, a quality that characterizes his work. With his images, Rauzier creates a dream from the reality that his lens captures. He constructs each grand piece the way our minds compose dreams, taking raw material from our lives, coloring it with our psyches and a pinch of our collective consciousness until voilà—you are being chased off a cliff by a purple rhinoceros! The idyllic scene depicted in “Après
midi d’Automne” (Autumn Afternoon, p. 72)—which oddly appears more like summer than autumn because of the verdant fields, scantily dressed women and only a hint of fall color in the foliage— contains many references to the story of the Garden of Eden, complete with apples and serpents. However, it is rich with so many more details that are initially not so obvious. Amongst those details, there is a book open to the title page, Les Liaisons Dangereuse (Dangerous Liaisons).