Awarded
Florian Joye
Photo research 'Desert Gate'
Photography
Awarded
Photo research 'Desert Gate'
Photography
Planned and built reality
What have we here? Models, stage sets or built reality? These are images that are hard to decipher, confusing and disturbing. Images reminiscent of Hollywood, Las Vegas or Disneyland. But what we actually have before us is evidence of the delight the United Arab Emirates take in building, above all in Dubai. Future and present, ideal and reality are skilfully mixed in Florian Joye's series of photographs 'Desert Gate', which oscillates between promotional and documentary photography. Sheikh Rashid Al Maktoum, a former ruler of Dubai, said shortly before he died to his son and successor: 'My son, there will be an Arabia after the petrodollar, and it is up to you to build it.' His father's challenge has now led the son to wrest land from the sea and force the desert back in order to build attractions in the little Emirate that will appeal to people from all over the world and boost the economy. This decision has placed the whole country on a very different footing: it is in a state of transition from yesterday to tomorrow. This peaks in pictures of elaborately constructed stage sets, placed in the no man's land of the desert to show what will stand here one day. Architectural models metres long showing all the upheaval under great acrylic covers make the planning look like Science Fiction. Other pictures show high-rise housing that has actually been built in the middle of the desert; they seem so cut off from civilization and water that it would seem impossible that the place could be brought to life. Photographer Florian Joye's work shows us how close reality and fiction are to each other in these latitudes at the moment, and how the building projects presented are for some a source of pride and confidence and for others of doubts and fear about these exceptional circumstances. The photographer has recorded dream and nightmare soberly and captured them on paper.
Ariana Pradal
Florian Joye
Born in
1979
Education
Photographer
Group name
Novembre Magazine