Relæ

Came across Per-Anders Jörgensen at the Singapore National Library this evening! Or rather, his photos, in Christian Puglisi’s Relæ: A Book of Ideas.

I own several issues of Fool Magazine, the crazy brilliant gastronomy mag that that Per-Anders runs with his wife Lotta, but have not sat down with this book on chef Christian Puglisi’s journey with his restaurant—Relæ—before this. The book is also a product of the team behind Fool.

I never read about food, with Fool Magazine being the sole exception. Fool makes the culture and creativity around feeding, accessible and quite delightful to the plebian. And everything about Fool and its offshoots is brilliant: from the writing, to design, editing, and print.

And the pictures—most of which are P-A’s—are exquisite. That always helps.

Relæ is no different.

It helps that I’m familiar with these pictures, despite having never seen the book until tonight. I’ve worked with pictures and the photographer himself on and off, for various projects with Fujifilm Nordic over the years, like the short movie (below) about Per-Anders I produced for Fujifilm back in 2015.

I’ve listened to Per-Anders talk about his work and process a fair bit over the years, and it’s always enlightening, as he is generous with his experience and what it’s given him. What he and Lotta have built over the years with Fool, and all the other creative work they do with their agency, is inspirational.

(I’m a big fan, if it isn’t obvious.)

These photographs continue to arrest me. The magic of the still image paired with words exerts a hold over me like no other medium—no matter how whizz-bang—can.

And no one puts it together like the Fool team. It’s food, but also insanity, brilliance and love.