Why did I write The Silver Line?
Inspiration is one of our most precious allies. It resonates like a calling and allows us to let the light pierce in and flow all over our spirits, lifting some thin veils. It gives us the power to enter a very personal work, to see and understand what surrounds us with a more accurate sensitiveness and subtlety, and to let our eyes, heart, mind and soul become a whole.
The Silver Line is a book about inspiration, how it rises and grows, where it comes from and how deeply rooted it can be. Throughout our days, months, years, we realize that each sign, each essential moment or crucial encounter is a step forward to what we need to achieve in our lives. I was recently drawn into the making of the Silver Line, started this work in June 2021 and finished it in July. Its truth and genuine texture were already there, underground but wide and alive, needing only a gentle push to fly open. For all these reasons, The Silver Line is “an Essence Book”.
Bio:
For twenty years I traveled the world shooting pictures for such French publications as Marie-Claire Maison, Résidences Décoration, Oui Magazine, Série Limitée, as well as for Arte, The Franco-German Cultural Channel. Twelve years ago I discovered Memphis Tennessee. I was totally electrified by the resonances of its music, and I immersed myself into a body of work anchored to my early childhood in Maryland. As if traveling by raft on America’s greatest rivers, this labor of love carried me from the Memphis Blues, to Mississippi, and then back to Maryland, offering me endless inspiration, enriched by a ballet of rare and rhythmical coincidences that came into my life. I call this weaving of synchronicities “signs” and visualize it like a red thread that I have pushed forward from inception. When we used to live in Maryland, my father would take my brother Hubert and me in a place out of time, hidden and nearly secret beside the Susquehanna River. In this landscape of water, large rocks and airy trees, with eagles turning in the sky by hundreds during their April migration, everything was soulful, obvious, clear and spiritual. While I was playing on this ground I know something related to Black History was coming to me: layer after layer, the deep brown and fertile earth was handing me down its stories which were to be caught softly but deeply in my subconscious.
My equipment:
I use my Nikon D300 which is quite old: I often say with a smile, that all along these years, we got used to each other like friends from back in the days. I don’t need much more, because for me a camera is just a tool and this one is the right one.
I embroidered all the symbols belonging to The Silver Line, and photographed them to embed their sheer meaning into my work. Stitching and embroidering is a big part of my creative process, it adds something important to my expression. Fabric is essential to me as it symbolizes the fabric of our lives: I see our Life threads in the threads that help me stitch and embroider.
Specs:
The 20-page book is nestled in an Indian Indigo waxed paper graced with a silver thread, and wrapped in a white cotton paper envelope.
The Silver Line is a hand-made book of artist. Each copy is numbered and signed.
Book size: 7 x 9,5 inch— 20 pages, including 8 original photographs and a poem.
Price: $245
Contact for purchase: beachauvin@wanadoo.fr
The Silver Line (c) Béatrice Chauvin 2021
