shashasha

In this 2020 photobook “Estudio Elemental del Levante,” Spanish photographer Ricardo Cases analyzes the universe of the Levante region as a colorful, wild, unsettling and anarchic place firmly settled in its Spanishness. In a visual language developed over the past ten years, Cases’ photographs form a supersaturated journey through landscape and people, constituting a commentary that is both sincere, affectionate, critical and full of irony.
Cases’ vision is further expressed through collage-like cut-outs of several individual pages, erasing vital parts of the images while blending them with others.

“The palm tree, the charanga and the red palm weevil form a triangle that represents the spiritual map of modern Spain's systemic crash, of a violent and screeching collision. The combination of it all generates a dissonant symphony. Like a desperate alarm signal, the grating shriek of metal can be heard in the images themselves…
In short, Estudio elemental del Levante is a requiem for a way of life that enjoyed its period of mad splendor.” (from the publisher’s statement)