Review in a German Magazine: Dance for You Magazine

Dance for You Magazine is a German Magazine. I was very pleased and happy with the review of my book by Volkmar Draeger. Translation in English below.

Englisch translation

BOOK: "Where the Spirit Meets the Bone"

Monique Belier's Body Impressions

Monique Belier seeks those fleeting moments in the transition between movements when dancers are unaware of their actions. In one of her bass-colored commentaries on otherwise empty pages. "Where the Spirit Meets the Bone." The title, inspired by a poem from the late American poet Miller Williams, who passed away in 2015, encapsulates Belier's artistic essence—connecting mind and body, depicting the essence of human movement, and narrating stories through the language of the body.

A 2023 graduate of the Photo Academy in Amsterdam, Monique Belier reassures viewers that she, like a young farmer adapting to nature, captures the essence of the moment. Her photographs are not posed but rather capture fragmented moments, dissolving into unique body parts. Some shots evoke the spontaneity reminiscent of François Truffaut's "Wild Child," whether it's the flowing hair in the breeze or the tense stillness within the growing grass. The body, always integrated into its surroundings, appears against the backdrop of a woodland or a masonry. Hands speak, bodies bend and twist, legs stretch between the ground and a tree, and one foot connects with the earth while another points toward an object, telling a story of shattered narratives.

The portrayed subjects wear clothes, yet the focus is not on the attire but on the ritual's revelation. The photographer captures what is essential, uncovering the nuances revealed in "Tanzer am Strand" or the woman pressing against a peeling wall in "Elea." Belier's double-blessed photos, predominantly in black and white, offer a photographic panorama of discreet sensitivity. The book, featuring almost 120 illuminated pages and showcasing nearly 50 photos, spans a range of moods, from contemplation to agitation, encapsulating the diverse forms of expression that characterize Belier's work.

In this collection, Belier, connected to the third decade of the 21st century, brings forth the essence of the past two decades. The photographs, arranged with a keen sensibility, convey a variety of expressions. The book, a testament to Monique Belier's artistry, invites viewers to delve into the silent stories captured behind the lens.

Volkmar Draeger

Robin Titchener's Best Photo Books of 2023 list

I couldn't be prouder to discover that my book made it to Robin Titchener's Best Photo Books of 2023 list. These lists are published annually on the Photobook Store UK website. I couldn't have asked for a better end to the year.

This is what he wrote about my book:

Where the Spirit Meets The Bone by Monique Belier, self-published

The second book on the list to take its inspiration from the world of dance is this stunning debut from Dutch photographer Monique Belier. A former dancer herself, this achingly elegant hand finished release captures the spirit and abandon of a performer's private world, as observed by an artist that clearly speaks their physical language fluently. Shades of Penn's studio work and Meeks' mastery of natural settings. A beautiful introduction to a fresh new talent.

If you want to read about all the incredible books on the list, please go to website by clicking the link.

Photo-book list 2023 by Robin Titchener

Dark Room Session by Isabel Hernandez

Isabel Hernandez from the Dark Room Session Newsletter, wrote about my work. you can click on the link (button) to go to the newsletter.

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With a text from Pascal Quignard - El origen de la danza

“Forget the rhythm. Try not to be aware of your horns. Give up the ground. Lose your muscles. Stop training. Please don’t follow the music. Don't bind yourselves to anything any more. Think of being born; that is the essential. Weigh yourself suddenly with all your weight on the ground like animals do in the forest. Lean on the humiliated pain of the ground. Then, surrender to the movement that arises. A cow's movement in the field raises its nose and moos. A black fly movement on the glass takes off, buzzes, leaves, crashes again, and suddenly traces an immense loop in the room’s air. A movement of pike opens its mouth in the silent and black water where it passes, where it bites, where it swallows. Become the neck of the bison that turns suddenly backwards on the wall of the well of Lascaux and that expires all its breath in the perpetual night of the origin of the men who are painting their origin on the dark side of the mountain. It becomes the movement that the old Japanese peasant woman tries to make when she gets up on the Tami, groaning because her knees are so crippled. Explore this movement as clumsily as possible, that is to say, with the same difficulty she feels. Only clumsiness is native. In the same way that Klee, right-handed, in his Bern atelier, forced himself to draw with his left hand, painfully put his injured knee on the ground, place in front of you both hands with palms down in the dust and pull, pull with your fingers, drag your backside, advance on all fours towards the light that is before your eyes and that is nothing more than the burning explosion of a star in the continuous night. Beauty is linked to the awkwardness of the origin. The first step taken by the child is a stumbling, faltering step, and it is the most beautiful step there can be in the sublunar world where the children of mortals survive as best they can.”

Pascal Quignard - The origin of dance

The best according to PS (Parool, newspaper)

I found my work in the Dutch Newspaper this weekend!

English translation of the article: In this exhibition, which is composed of photographs from her graduation project, Belier focuses on the body as a means to express thoughts and feelings, just as a dancer can convey inner feelings in a dance. The exhibition also includes a photo book with the same title

till 12 November, Café de Engelbewaarder

Review by Robin Titchener

On 16-08-2023 Robin Titchener published his review about my book ‘Where the spirit meets the bone’, on his website.

Click here to read the review on his website.

(Review by Robin Titchener)

Without a doubt a passion project, this beautiful debut from Dutch photographer Monique Belier is a visual dialogue, a love letter to dance.

A conversation between photographer and practitioner, it is a body of work that is shot through with both the understanding and empathy of one whose lifeblood is rooted in the art form.

Teacher, choreographer, to discover that Belier has a background in dance comes as no surprise, her love of the medium is imbued in every image.

In a gently toned monochrome essay Belier has presented us with a series of visual journeys, a celebration of movement and personal expression. This in and of itself is not a particularly unusual statement, in fact it could well be seen as the definition of dance itself. However the journeys referred to are those that occur between the performer's first movement - from the first intake of breath - and the last.

The points during which the dancer is a captive of their own world, allowing the subconscious to reign and thoughts to be as liquid as limbs in encouraging them to surrender to the ecstasy of abandon. Belier's images observe these moments of purity.

Physical sculpture and contortion.
Unrestrained and without boundaries or rules.
The creation of art is indeed an intimate process.

This spontaneous expression is the kinetic equivalent of Miles Davis or Charlie Parker in full flow.

A disconnect of breath and notes, soaring like birdsong,

Of jazz made physical.
Of oil hitting canvas,
A chorus of colours, animating and stimulating.

Whether laid down on canvas with a surgeon's precision or hurled across a welcoming and expectant limbo, its destination is the same, a rapture returned. The meticulous perfection of a Canaletto or Wyeth. Or the abstract modernist landscape of aural splashes, stabs and sweeps. wombly in motion.
Behind the eyes worlds unfold and yes, spirit meets bone.

This orchestrated amalgam of movements can be controlled and precise or wild and unpredictable.

Canaletto or Twombly…
These practitioners speak in tongues.
The language of dreams for an audience of dreamers.

It seems only fitting that the object be as elegant and understated as its subject matter and in this respect also, When The Spirit Meets The Bone does not disappoint. Housed in an illustrated slipcover which allows the pale softcover book to be removed vertically, we are greeted with warm and soft Munken paper stock. The book's open spine is barely concealed by a light gauze which  acts almost as an ethereal quarter binding, delicate and attached only along the spine itself.

The images ebb and flow, they pulse with life, strain with the efforts of the performers and whether Belier presents faceless abstract contortions or considered portraits, the passion, intensity and commitment of her protagonists is luminous.

We have been granted access to a private world, away from the formality of a choreographed performance available to view en masse and with rigid regularity.

Between these pages we can revisit in quiet moments at our leisure, perhaps whilst Mingus whispers in our ears.

Where The Spirit Meets The Bone is self published.

The first edition is sold out but a second signed and numbered run of 150 copies is expected in September 2023 and can be preordered from www.moniquebelier.nl

A review by Alex Prior

Alex Prior, Artist and Photo book reviewer wrote about my work after sending him a copy of ‘Where the spirit meets the bone’.
I tried to translate it in Dutch below.

Bodies in flux, in ferment, in vital motion, as if pausing even for the briefest of moments would lead to a decay, a rust setting into to supple bones.

Invisible trails left in their wake, the air being the only witness, scythed, and caught between fingers and thighs and toes.
An internal rhythm is established, a connection made to memories past and moments present, breathe is draw and muscles tensed, before intuition takes over and leads the body in unplanned directions.

Turns and twists, trusting in the fine balance between thrust and momentum.
Heady contortions.
Silent, but for the quick strike of breath, pounding of soles to the floor and the soft slap of limb against limb.
A wordless salvo, conversations woven in space, calligraphic lines traced by fingertips and toes, arcing, halting, falling.

Each pause framed as sculptural majesty.
Carved in space and cast in fading light.
Compressed then stretched, pliable like clay continously formed and reformed by a restless mind.

Breathless bounding forward only to be repelled by some invisible force, a shock wave, a shadow that mimicks and mocks.
Veins protrude and muscles burn, tendons stretch, and new limits are reached and then surpassed.

At the edge, the limit, the litmus, but not the end.
Each new swoop and sway of limb and breathe took into lung is a kind of freedom reached.
The body as a murmuration.

Alex Prior
@photobook_reviewer

(Dutch translation)

Lichamen in beweging, in gisting, in vitale beweging, alsof zelfs het kortste moment van pauze tot verval zou leiden, tot roest die zich nestelt in soepele botten.

Onzichtbare sporen achtergelaten in hun kielzog, waarbij de lucht de enige getuige is, afgesneden en gevangen tussen vingers en dijen en tenen. Een interne cadans wordt vastgesteld, een verbinding gemaakt met herinneringen uit het verleden en momenten in het heden, adem wordt ingehaald en spieren spannen zich aan, voordat intuïtie het overneemt en het lichaam in ongeplande richtingen leidt.

Wendingen en draaien, vertrouwend op de fijne balans tussen kracht en momentum. Bedwelmende kronkels. Stilte, behalve het snelle snakken naar adem, het bonzen van voeten op de vloer en de zachte klap van ledemaat tegen ledemaat. Een woordeloos salvo, gesprekken geweven in de ruimte, kalligrafische lijnen getraceerd door vingertoppen en tenen, boogvormig, stilstaand, vallend.

Elke pauze omlijst als sculpturale majesteit. Uitgehouwen in de ruimte en gegoten in vervagend licht. Samengeperst en vervolgens uitgerekt, kneedbaar als klei, voortdurend gevormd en hervormd door een rusteloze geest.

Ademloos voorwaarts springend, alleen om te worden teruggeworpen door een onzichtbare kracht, een schokgolf, een schaduw die nabootst en bespot. Aders steken uit en spieren branden, pezen strekken zich uit en nieuwe grenzen worden bereikt en vervolgens overschreden.

Op de rand, de grens, de lakmoesproef, maar niet het einde. Elke nieuwe duik en zwaai van ledemaat en elke ingeademde ademhaling is een soort bereikte vrijheid. Het lichaam als een zwerm.