In November of 2013, I went to Peru to meet a therapist for my deaf ear. Upon my arrival, I can barely keep standing having survived a terrible episode of vertigo during the flight. It will be ten days before I am able to lift my head and walk normally.
Tired of being prisoner of a malaise that prevents me from communicating with others, I begin to photograph landscapes and ancient statuettes, silent subjects that don’t ask me how I’m doing, or where I am from. I am completely enchanted by these mountains and valleys that are so dense, so deep, and so alive. The rocks seem to vibrate, while the trees seem to breathe and the water to clamour.
Finally, I am able to lift my head up and smile at the people that I meet. To better lend an ear, my lens keeps getting closer and closer. And I take pictures. My camera has become near-sighted and I do not even realise it. Up close, I discover new landscapes. As if their faces revealed a certain connection with the murmuring elements of this nature: mountains, mist, rivers and valleys. As if their eloquent gaze could break the silence of the Inca statuettes, wooden or terra cotta, wrinkled and centuries old; or magnify the whispering of the walls of their ancestral cities.
I’ve not had another episode of vertigo since. Even with my broken ear.