High Altitude

Alt + 1000. Festival de photographie 2013

Alt. + 1000, the festival of contemporary photography held in the village of Rossinière in the foothills of the Swiss Alps, exhibits the works of artists who share a common theme.The topic for the 2013 edition is altitude. This clearly includes depictions of mountain landscapes, a subject that has never ceased to captivate artists ever since the painter Caspar Wolf’s rambles in the Alps in the eighteenth century. But the sense of altitude can also be expressed through aerial views or through the idea of vertigo. The means that can be employed are many and they all offer the opportunity to reflect on space, territory, and matters of scale. These wonderful photographs, be they the work of prizewinners in the competition or of guest artists, all address the notion of altitude and can be read at many levels: artistic, documentary, or conceptual.

Nathalie Herschdorfer is an exhibition organizer and art historian specialising in photography. She is the director of the Alt. + 1000 Photographic Festival and of the Swiss branch of the Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography (FEP). She was a curator at the Musée de l’Elysée, Switzerland, for twelve years.