He 29 October 2024, A tongue of water entered the Torrent workshop of Oriolano photographer Ricardo Cases and came out again, taking about eight hundred books from his personal library. When the mar that flooded l'Horta Sud drained into the coast, leaving behind mountains of rubble and a thick layer of mud, The specimens were appearing in the ravine, and was able to open them and photograph them before the pages dried and were stuck together forever. Some had recombined collages random, others had been intervened and resignified by the mud. One year after the disaster, publishes them sewn into a photobook called Catalog in which there is no trace of customs, the humor and irony characteristic of his photography, there is chance, loss, resignification, memory and nature imposing its mark. We talk about his latest project with this compulsive photographer who has made us look at objects as anodyne as a bike seat in a different way., an awning, a trunk, an orange or a gas station.
The people around you and their customs are common subjects of your photography., but in Catalog The background protagonist is you and your books. How do you handle that role??
It is a very different book for me because it arises in an extraordinary situation and fulfills a first important need.: that of seeing and photographing for the last time a selection of the books that I valued most in my library. I was photographing how everything turned out, documenting the disaster, trying to register the status of my workshop, from the neighborhood, from the ravine. Everything had been transformed and, intuitively, I needed to photograph it like someone who wants to say goodbye to something that is going to disappear.. And while I photographed the books I could find, I began to understand that they could become a new book., that could function as a seed for a potential new library, with the aim of moving forward and not stagnating.
The photographs of Catalog They are a sober and eventful testimony of that great catastrophe of the 29 October. Is your role as a photographer more secondary than usual here?, no?
I don't see it as secondary, What I do see is that it plays another role.: that of taking inventory of what remains, not so much crafting an image as I usually do, until cataloguing, solving a need.
Although you do commissioned projects, like photographing the Republican campaign in Florida, Your most personal photos usually capture the absurdity of everyday life that surrounds you.. What images have stayed with you after the catastrophe??
I have had a different experience compared to when I covered similar situations as a photojournalist.. In this case, I have not been able to photograph the others (as my friend Biel Aliño has done so masterfully). In my case, I think I understood that, when I'm part of what's happening, I don't have enough distance to photograph it.
When the water finally went down, under what conditions did you find the studio?
It was all covered in mud. Thanks to a large group of volunteers, among which were the Torrent artists Cris Bartual, Sergio Rocafort and Miquel Ponce, could get everything out.
What kind of books did you lose?? Were you able to save any? Where did the catalogs that had been washed away appear??
I lost all my photography production (exhibitions, books, models, archive, etc.) and my library was crushed and scattered across the Horteta ravine. Also that of my friend and brother-in-law Eugeni, bookseller (Odysseus Books, Per-r-ucho) which housed an incredible collection of books and vinyl.
Mud in its different textures stains all the photographs. We see it metallic, liquid, sandy, pasted… When did you realize that these photographs had aesthetic and documentary value??
There has been no aesthetic intention in this book, just cover this need to document, to make memory.
You are from Vega Baja, a flood-prone region also accustomed to torrential rains. Have you experienced any of these episodes in Orihuela?
Of course, These types of situations are part of the memory of my people, that has suffered departures from the Segura River a few times. In fact, I was photographing the Dana del 2019 in Vega Baja and I ended up doing an exhibition project in Orihuela with the Portuguese painter Martinho Costa.
You have made many photobooks of different types.. What do you like so much about this format??
I understand that the book is the natural support of photography. Since I had some photographic awareness I tried to publish photos, first in newspapers and magazines, and then in fanzines and books. I try to always work freely when I consider any idea., both in form and substance.
What new projects are you up to??
In 2026 I will publish The carpenter, a work on Michelangelo's nap, the carpenter working under the house where we live now.
