Lise Gaudaire carries out an anthropological, documentary, artistic -and also probably intimate and introspective- search or investigation through the Axarquia valley (from the Arabic Ash Sharqiyah, الشرقية; "eastern"), in Andalusia, between the Costa del Sol and the Costa Tropical.

In this region, “exotic” fruits and vegetables are cultivated on a large scale and intensively, in monoculture, as is the case with avocados, which today occupy the slopes of the mountains as far as the eye can see. Although the landscape of the Axarquia may seem green at first glance, under its generous foliage a raw, parched, thirsty and monochrome soil can be seen.

And yet, in the heart of this "almost desert", Lise finds a reassuring bubble of greenery, an oasis: Fernando's greenhouse, where he consciously grows plants with low water consumption.

In Oasis, Lise Gaudaire reveals her own experiences and projections to raise the notions of disorientation, exoticism or mental and fantastic representation of the landscape. If the word today evokes a fertile island due to the presence of water in the middle of a vast desert, it is often forgotten that an oasis is artificial, entirely created by man, whose permanent attention is necessary to ensure the proper maintenance of the irrigation system: in short, an artificial paradise. The oasis is not just a shady palm grove: behind the cliché, it raises the terribly contemporary questions of the globalized economy and its ecological impact, sustainable agriculture and water consumption.

Lise Gaudaire focuses her work on the relationships that man maintains with the landscape, his territory, the way he has of contemplating and apprehending it and, especially, those who work on it.

Beyond their sensitive dimension, her photographic series resemble both an anthropological study and an archeology of the landscape. In her works, Lise Gaudaire mixes photography, drawing and writing, seeking to question the artistic gesture itself through the decompartmentalization of disciplines and their inexhaustible dialogue. 

In 2019, she received "L'aide Inviduelle à la Création" from the DRAC Bretagne, France. In 2020 she enjoyed two residencies: at the Galerie L'Imagerie de Lannion and at the Center d'Art Contemporain de Pontmain, both in France. In 2021 she was selected to do a one-year residency at the Académie de France-Casa de Velázquez, in Madrid, and she obtained a scholarship from the Institut français.

ISBN: 978-84-09-44290-4
Dalpine, 2022
Photographs & drawings: Lise Gaudaire
Texts: Lise Gaudaire & Émilie Flory
Design: Jaime Narváez
Pre-press: La Troupe
Printed by Artes Gráficas Palermo
16 x 20,5 cm
96 pages
Softcover with slipcase
Language: bilingual French/Spanish