Series · Landscape

The White Forest

Three photographs from the beech forest at Creux du Van in the Jura mountains of Switzerland — shot in November after a heavy snowfall, when the trees were coated in hoarfrost and the whole forest had turned white.

The Sentinels · The Gathering · The Nave

The story

I drove up to the Creux du Van on a November morning after two days of snowfall. The road to the cirque was borderline passable. By the time I reached the forest, I was the only person there.

The beeches at the rim of the cirque are old and gnarled — shaped by centuries of wind and snow. That morning they were completely covered in hoarfrost, every branch coated white, the whole forest silent. The fog sat just above the canopy and the light was flat and even, no shadows anywhere.

I made these three photographs in the space of about an hour. The forest barely changed. Nothing moved.

As a triptych

The three prints move from the intimate to the monumental. The Sentinels puts you inside the forest, close to individual trees. The Gathering shows the mass of them, dense and pressing. The Nave steps back to reveal the full structure — the cathedral that the beeches make when they arch toward each other.

Together they are a single place seen three ways. Apart, each one holds its own silence.

Printed on canvas over aluminium dibond. Available in a caisse américaine frame or frameless. Custom size made for your wall. Printed in Switzerland.