2016 - 2017
These photographs were made during a several week trip into the rainforest of southern Cameroon, along the Boumba River, not far from the Congo border.
I have been back a few times since this inaugural journey, but it is my first impression of the country there that has stayed with me - a collection of flashback-like memories and strangely cinematic moments that are beyond my ability to organize into any sort of linear narrative. Certain light recalls to mind the exhaustion and boredom of two-day drives on forest roads, the smell of alcohol on the breath of a drunken army officer with malaria yellowed eyes at some unknown checkpoint somewhere.
I think of river crossings on old barges or dugout canoes, salmonella poisoning, forest fires and massive storms. I hear the violent scream of a silverback gorilla deep in the forest - shaking the trees, beating his chest, then vanishing. I think of rain, dust and bees; the reenactment of a hunt and a bongo skull dancing in the half light of the fire. I see a French bible and pygmies with sharpened teeth, dead elephants, 7.62mm shell casings and the barefoot track of a lone poacher. I recall stories of Loa Loa - the eye worm parasite and how the old timers used to pour paraffin on their feet after crossing rivers. I think of massive columns of ants and chimpanzees in the early morning mist and see logging trucks overturned on forest roads. The snakes - Green Vipers, Gaboon Vipers and a Mamba in the canopy. I see it all and I think I finally understand what Joseph Conrad meant when he said, “It was written I should be loyal to the nightmare of my choice.”
I have been back a few times since this inaugural journey, but it is my first impression of the country there that has stayed with me - a collection of flashback-like memories and strangely cinematic moments that are beyond my ability to organize into any sort of linear narrative. Certain light recalls to mind the exhaustion and boredom of two-day drives on forest roads, the smell of alcohol on the breath of a drunken army officer with malaria yellowed eyes at some unknown checkpoint somewhere.
I think of river crossings on old barges or dugout canoes, salmonella poisoning, forest fires and massive storms. I hear the violent scream of a silverback gorilla deep in the forest - shaking the trees, beating his chest, then vanishing. I think of rain, dust and bees; the reenactment of a hunt and a bongo skull dancing in the half light of the fire. I see a French bible and pygmies with sharpened teeth, dead elephants, 7.62mm shell casings and the barefoot track of a lone poacher. I recall stories of Loa Loa - the eye worm parasite and how the old timers used to pour paraffin on their feet after crossing rivers. I think of massive columns of ants and chimpanzees in the early morning mist and see logging trucks overturned on forest roads. The snakes - Green Vipers, Gaboon Vipers and a Mamba in the canopy. I see it all and I think I finally understand what Joseph Conrad meant when he said, “It was written I should be loyal to the nightmare of my choice.”