Photo Book review: Synchronicity

Synchronicity

By Fabrice Strippoli

Give it the time it deserves.

In Synchronicity, Fabrice Strippoli offers us something remarkable in a collection of images made in Canada’s largest urban centres: the quiet city. Oh, there’s construction and traffic and streetcars alright, but there’s a pervasive sense of calm over it all. It’s as if the photographer has turned the volume control on the streets from ‘10’ down to ‘1.’ Or maybe even ‘off.’ And with all that quiet we can take the time to notice subtlety in the black and white film photographs.

A man walks along Spadina saving a cigarette behind his ear for later. Kids huddle together to whisper secrets. A woman nods off in a park with a straw hat perched on her face to cut the sun. No one seems in a hurry, perhaps because they are busy with interior worlds rather than the streets around them.

In the same way, the reader has to slow down to take it all in. Blink and you might miss it. Sure, there are more aggressive photographers stalking the streets, but they’re on the hunt for flash and adrenaline, not insight.

What you’ll find in Strippoli’s work, page after page, is intimacy and respect for the ordinary people you pass every day, but may never meet.

Released in September 2022 with an introduction from the photographer and short texts by Ron Sexsmith and Justin Kingsley, Synchronicity is a very human book. Give it the time it deserves.

Get your copy today!

Figure 1 Publishing

Hardcover, 132 pages

$40 CDN