Stone by Stone is the second monograph of photographer Taj Forer, a lecturer of art at UNC-Chapel Hill and a founding editor of the documentary photography biannual, Daylight Magazine. A collection of fifty square-format colour images, the work shows one way of interacting with the natural world, in a minimal hunter-gatherer type of existence. Shelter is built from sticks and earth, leather dries atop tree branches, a woven basket sits on the ground. Rocks in the woods once again receive meaning apart from something to trip over: they’re tools, weapons, building components. Stone by Stone shows a return to things so basic, there’s slight distress at wondering “what is that, what does it do?” In the post-industrial world, very few of us need to worry about raw materials or building something from scratch, and yet, with such an uncertain future, perhaps nothing else is so relevant as our connection with the earth.

Forer’s book offers no explanation of the objects contained, their meaning or how they came to be. It’s simply an imaginative guide to a natural existence. Man’s presence is evident, from a hand holding an apple to a handprint in mud, yet it’s unimposing, creative and complementary to the land it stands on. Simple and beautiful, the photographs in Stone by Stone could have been taken at any point in human history, yet are perhaps eerie in their prescience.

Stone by Stone is available for sale from publisher Kehrer Verlag.

Reviewed by Katherine Oktober Matthews.