Chris Mann is a London-based photographer, originally from South Yorkshire, who started his darkroom journey with us three years ago. He has just published his first book Valley of the Moon.
About VALLEY OF THE MOON
Jordan’s Wadi Rum desert, translated literally as 'Valley of the Moon' in English, is renowned for its red sands, Mars-like topography, and nomadic Bedouin tribes. The series of images in this book, shot entirely on black and white 35mm film and hand-printed in the darkroom, “trace the viewer's imagination through a stark depiction of this dream-like world and its ephemera; offering a subjective window into a reality unbound by time or place. A landscape both unchanged for thousands of years, yet seemingly transient, Valley of the Moon presents a visual dialogue with the desert and its transcendental oscillations between man and nature, light and dark, reality and imagination.”
When Chris first came to darkroom in 2020 he had recently returned from a trip to Jordan as a volunteer with a skateboarding charity, where he had spent a night in a Bedouin camp in Wadi Rum. Reviewing the photographs taken in the desert on his return to London he knew he had only scratched the surface and wanted more. Returning to Jordan in October 2021, he spent three nights in Wadi Rum equipped with two cameras to shoot the images that eventually became the Valley of the Moon book.
“Between those two trips, my relationship with the desert and how I imagined it evolved significantly, carving out a visual void in my imagination that needed to be filled. Throughout this time my technical approach to photography was also evolving as I moved away from digital and leaned solely into film photography and the darkroom as a process. I wanted to be fully immersed in Wadi Rum’s already otherworldly environment and explore the potential of what I could achieve photographically, shooting everything on black and white film. During the day I would explore and shoot the mars-like landscape mostly from the back of a moving Jeep, and at night I'd stargaze and shoot with high-speed film in the Bedouin camp where I was staying.”
Chris found the challenge of working with film, with the unknown/uncertainty of the process and the lack of feedback in the moment, meant he could just shoot, “without bias, and as honestly and intuitively as possible”. On returning to London, once he had processed his films and started making test prints, the images started to coalesce into a unified ‘project’.
Valley of the Moon Artist Book:
Limited to 100 copies, 200 x 290mm, 56 pages, 27 black and white plates, Soft singer sewn cover with red pearlescent end papers. The book includes written texts by Shana Chandra. Published by Guest Editions
Chris Mann works predominantly with black and white 35mm film. Hand-printing his images in the darkroom, a process integral to his practice, his work has been exhibited across the UK and featured in a range of publications globally. Recently, he was shortlisted for the Palm* Photo Prize, and selected as an emerging European photography talent by GUP magazine.
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