Inside Mother Earth
Magische Höhlenwelten / Magic Caves / Grottes Magiques
Max Wisshak
My first coffee-table book concluded the era of slide films for me and was created in close collaboration with the publisher, Matthias Reuss of Edition Reuss. Taking a purist and artistic approach, it paired photos based on shape, colour, or texture, presenting them without any distracting captions or page numbers. However, there is a trilingual index providing information on each photo.
About: A fantastic journey into our planet’s interior. Nearly the entire surface of the earth has been photographed and documented. Our world has grown too small for us. But has everything really been researched, surveyed and settled, designed and built upon as we see it? When we turn our gaze inward and view the Earth’s interior, we discover new and far greater dimensions. Max Wisshak’s flashbulbs illuminate realms that otherwise dwell in eternal darkness, where he photographs a hidden world full of fairy-tale beauty.
With his artistic sensitivity for contrast and pictorial composition, he has succeeded in creating pictures which capture the magic that awaits travellers who dare to descend into the depths of the earth, to enter an inner world and delve into the roots of our essential being. In the midst of this wondrous world stands the solitary human being, small, with no one but himself to rely upon, and connected to life on the surface like a spider hanging from a gossamer thread.
This photo book by the dedicated scientist, speleologist and photographer Max Wisshak is not only a highlight for speleologists and geologists, but also and above all for people who are interested in nature and who haven't yet forgotten how to gaze in awe at the beauty of our world.
Contents: Preface / Getting to the Bottom of Caves (author’s preface) / A Journey into the Interior (foreword) / Light in the Darkness (foreword) / Images / Index (short description of the photographs featured in the book) / Acknowledgements
Trilingual: English, German, and French
Preface and Forewords: Ernst Waldemar Bauer, Angela Lang, and Jean-Pierre Bartholeyns
152 pages
144 colour photos
Hardcover 24 x 30 cm with dust jacket
Texts in German, English, and French
Edition Reuss 2008
ISBN 978-3-934020-67-2
Look Inside
What Reviewers Say
"… excellent photographs displayed to best advantage …"
"… a true coffee-table book, and an extremely good one at that …”
"… a book to captivate and become lost within …"
(C. Howes for Descent magazine)
"… Max’s photos tend towards a moodier style, with more shadow and black areas …"
"… there are many outstanding photos in this book, the standouts in my view being the shots from Austrian ice caves …"
"… certainly a great addition to any caver’s coffee table …"
(D. Bunnell for the NSS news)
"… Unfassbar! …"
"… Lange nicht mehr so gestaunt! …"
(M. Rasper for Natur & Kosmos)
"… eindrucksvoller Sinn für Bildaufbau, Licht und Schatten, Kontraste und auch Dramaturgie …"
"… Auswahl der Bilder ist erfrischend vielseitig, die Ausleuchtung erfreulich abwechslungs- und spannungsreich, und die Bildqualität atemberaubend …"
"… eine wahre Augenfreude, nicht nur für den Speläophilen, sondern auch für diejenigen, die offen für die Faszination der Höhlen aus sicherer Entfernung sind …"
(C. Klug for Geologisches Zentralblatt)
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