I wholly misunderstood Marjolein Martinot‘s Riverland… If you only read the publisher’s blurb (part of which appears in the back of the book), you might make the same error, and then again, you might immediately see it for what it is. So. Rather than rewriting and pretending nothing happened, in what follows, I reveal the limits of my imagination and point to the importance of doing just the tiniest bit of research before making any bold claims.*
Full disclosure: some time ago, Rachel Barker (the Barker, or one of them, in Stanley/Barker, one presumes) reached out and offered to send me a book. I was deeply and understandably flattered. Several weeks later, Riverland arrived. So: this is a sponsored review. I received the book for review purposes, and usual caveats apply: Stanley/Barker sent the book, but; they didn’t ask me to do anything at all (though we all know I’ll make an unboxing video and eventually, maybe write a review), they saw the unboxing video only after I uploaded it, and read this “review” only after I published it. Still…
Anyway. Let’s get on with it.
Short answer, and the mostly correct one, Riverland is a Covid lockdown project. Martinot took evening walks down to the river near her home in the South of France. The walk and the people laughing and climbing and splashing about brought some life and joy into the doldrums, beat back the creeping dread of lockdown and the Covid-19 era.
My original thoughts form a longer answer, and mistaken though it was, maybe there’s something there…
In the closing pages, Martinot recounts how she came to make the book. Like many of us in the post-2020, she found herself feeling stagnant, not really interested in the work or the pictures that she found. The world looked dull, lifeless. Things do, indeed, seem bleak, especially in more recent times.** One day she stumbled upon a riverbank where people came to splash and just relax. Martinot found her footing there and Riverland is the result.
Covid lockdown or whatever: this feeling of stagnation is an intimate friend of mine and I wonder if my river will ever come.
Looking back through Martinot’s Instagram, I recognize some of the themes of my own photographic history: photographing interesting light with no other thought than “pretty!” and little more result, if I even get there; the odd decent portrait of a family member. Martinot knows what she’s doing in ways I never have, and the Riverland work isn’t too very far from her older work. Yet maybe I can see the groove return.
Following an introductory portrait, Riverland opens with an interior view—interesting light of which I spoke—followed by a horse, lying on its side. Now, when I see a horse laying down, I think it’s dead. I seem to recall hearing or reading that horses (and cows and other hoofed animals) are born and live their entire lives on their feet, that they only lay down when very ill or dead… I know this is mistaken and wholly untrue, yet my first thought on seeing a horse lying prone on the ground remains “dead horse,.” I read these two pictures as “pretty light… ugh… flogging a dead horse,” and the subsequent transition to a few random landscapes seems like a search for something. A photograph of a woman, sitting on the riverbank with her back to the camera ends this early sequence, I think, as indicated by the next picture, in which two horses seem to smile in interested approval as they look down on us, peeking up through the grass.
In my (faulty) memory, I seem to remember horses appearing a few times throughout Riverland and I had a whole thing planned. In reality, there is only one other hose picture, featuring the front right shoulder and part of the neck and mane. This should’ve given me a clue to maybe think a bit more carefully, maybe do a bit of research… but it was not to be. Anyway. The horse pictures reminded me of the American flags in Robert Frank’s The Americans and I see, or saw, the horses as sort of chapter markers or way stations. This reading gives the book a story arc that maybe makes sense in the context of my earlier misunderstanding of the book, if not really in Martinot’s experience or work, with the (not) dead horse symbolizing an impasse and the two horses suggesting a way forward. But then what of the horse’s shoulder? Does this suggest another impasse? Is it something to lean on, as if “I found it… let me just rest here for a bit?”
I don’t really know…
I do know that Riverland is a sort of masterclass in late 20th and early 21st century photography and photobook making. There are landscapes, riverscapes, pleasantly blurred closeups of plants and things, beautifully composed photos of people lounging or jumping or standing in or around the lake, and de rigueur unsmiling portraits, all in black and white, mostly square, and with a healthy sprinkling of 4×5. I’m reminded of Niagara-period Alec Soth, mostly, and Martinot knows her Art History too: a group portrait of some young men vaping down by the river recalls Manet’s Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe, and I’m sure it’s not an accident.
| Concept | |
| Content | |
| Design |
Overall, Riverland rates a solid 4.2 stars.
Riverland remains available direct from Stanley/Barker, and if you want a nice preview, Martinot shared a bunch of pictures from the project on her Instagram. I’m privileged to receive a copy for review, and I might’ve bought a copy anyway. It’s a good book. Even though I got it wrong—again, Riverland is primarily a Covid-19 lockdown project—I like my first reading the best, and God willing I find my river one day too.
*In my day job, I constantly preach about the vital importance of research. “Research is your friend!” I proclaim…. Doctor! Heal thyself!
**I’m writing this in July 2025, from my comfortable-enough home in North Texas, USA, if that means anything to you.
