particles

“The world is a swarming of elementary events, immersed in the sea of a vast dynamical space which sways like the water of an ocean”
- Carlo Rovelli ‘Reality is not what it seems’

Since a young age, Julie van der Vaart has been fascinated by the concepts of time and space. For various photographic projects, she has explored the subject time, each time approaching it from a different perspective: imaginary (non-linear) time, deep time, and cyclical time.

‘Particles’ is a work that examines the constant transformation of the sea, viewing it from the perspective of a living being that is always changing and evolving. The sea embodies a continuous cycle—of ebb and flow, of evaporation and rain, of creation and destruction. The seashell, for example, lives through the sea, but is also crushed by her relentless waves, reduced to tiny grains of sand - and as such, losing its form, purpose and identity -. In this way, the sea becomes both a source of life and a force of obliteration, forever caught in the cycle of renewal and decay.

Much of Julie's work conveys this sense of dissolution. The bodies depicted are not fixed; rather, they appear to merge with the sea, becoming one with her, as if part of the endless flow of transformation.

Book Design by Matilde Vittoria Laricchia
Hand-crafted realization by Eugenia Koval