Flore: Les Rêveries de Lavinia

This book is now available for pre-order. Shipping will begin on 18 November. 

Limited edition of 600 

Lavinia: this Italian-sounding name of Latin origin evokes, on its own, a poetic world filled with the scents of citrus and honey. With this series, FLORE takes us on a journey reminiscent of a Grand Tour through Italy, much like the one undertaken by Romantic artists of the 19th century. The technique she uses —the soft focus, the grain of the images, their coloration reminiscent of autochromes— all contributes to a sense of travel through time.

As always in FLORE’s work, each of her series is rooted in a part of herself, as if it were connected to a greater, older story —as if she had inherited the memories of others and sought to make them come alive for us. Once again, there is something deeply personal here: while clearing out her aunt’s house, she discovered a bundle of letters— traces of a long friendship between her aunt and an Italian woman named Lavinia.

Haunted by this correspondence, FLORE has been journeying through Italy for the past ten years. Les rêveries de Lavinia is both an inner and initiatory voyage, leading us from the Amalfi Coast to Sicily, through Florence, Rome, Naples, Milan, Turin, Venice, and Lake Maggiore. Steeped in melancholy and suspended in time, the photographs awaken the imagination, telling the timeless story of a passionate love, composed of wanderings through Renaissance palaces and their gardens. Classical sculptures embody lovers, while the journey is punctuated by radiant landscapes and delicate still lifes.

Text in French.

©Photography by FLORE