Close to the Bayou

Limited advance copies available at:
ICP Photobook Fest, New York City, September 6-8
Unseen, Amsterdam, September 19-22
Miss Read, Berlin, October 11-13.

Expected to ship in November.

Close to the Bayou is a journey of art making in the face of death and explores what is passed on through that process. The work touches on themes related to male intimacy, sickness in isolation, mentorship, and cancer specifically.

Close to the Bayou is a documentation of the emotional space the artist and Thomas Mann, an uncle figure and artistic mentor share as Mann goes through treatment for prostate cancer during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. During that unprecedented period of isolation, Mann, a renowned jewelry and sculpture artist, continued producing work at a frenetic pace.

The work is meant to encourage audiences to question what it means to be close to the bayou. While that metaphorical space is open to interpretation, Close to the Bayou aims to guide viewers toward examining their own closeness with life and death, love, light, and the process of creating regardless of how much time we have left. As Staszewski came close to finishing this project, he was diagnosed with cancer himself which required surgery and chemotherapy. He had to reconsider if the project was finished and eventually decided to rework the project as he was forced to apply the metaphor he had been building to his own experience.

Dimitri Staszewski is a documentary photography and photojournalist interested in both lyrical and more literal expressions of the photographic medium. Bookmaking is central to his practice.

Author: Dimitri Staszewski
Design: Caleb Cain Marcus, Luminosity Lab

ISBN: 978-1-959684-06-0
Dimensions: 7.56 x 9.12 inches
Number of pages: 120 of varying sizes
Binding: Hardcover Swiss

Expected to ship in November.