Book of the Week: A Pick from Rafal Milach

Book of the Week Book of the Week: A Pick by Rafal Milach This week's Book of the Week pick comes from photographer Rafal Milach who has selected The Irreversible by Maciek Nabrdalik.

The Irreversible by Maciek Nabrdalik. Exit Zero, 2013.

 

This week's Book of the Week pick comes from photographer Rafal Milach. Milach has selected The Irreversible by Maciek Nabrdalik with text by Agnieszka Nabrdalik.

"The book The Irreversible is a physical experience. It feels uncomfortable and coarse. The sandpaper on the cover hurts your fingers. The longer you hold the book in your hands, the more disturbing it feels. This is also the case with the subject matter of The Irreversible project. Page by page you read (or rather have the impression of hearing) voices of Nazi death camp survivors. But rather than being historical accounts, the 45 stories in the book are a testimony to human experience in the extreme conditions of a concentration camp. You learn what it feels like to look straight into the eyes of your torturer after the war, how your own mother fails to recognise you on your comeback home or what dress cut you imagine to forget about the smoke coming out of the crematorium chimney. I do not feel at ease while reading the intimate testimonies, yet I feel comforted, having an impression that together with their protagonists Agnieszka and Maciek Nabrdalik found humans in situations where one would least expect it." —Rafal Milach

The Irreversible by Maciek Nabrdalik. Exit Zero, 2013.

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Sasha Abukovich

Rafal Milach is a Polish photographer and book artist based in Warsaw. He held solo shows in CO Berlin, and Zacheta National Gallery of Art. He was awarded with World Press Photo, POYi and Magnum Foundation Emergency Grant. Rafal's monographs include: 7 Rooms, In the car with R and Black Sea of Concrete. He is the founder of Sputnik Photos.






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