Sanctuary Frozen in Time

A photographic account of a 30,000 km odyssey across Mongolia

When nothing but earth, heaven and nature are the companions of your days and nights,
then life is a wonderful journey into the immensity of true freedom.

By the breath of an atom the universe arose from nothingness and light sprung from it.
From this seemingly void and black expanse billions of stars emanated—celestial bodies that nomads, always gazing at the sky, began to worship and follow as guides shepherding their journey on earth. As the nomads pray to these heavenly bodies, they, in turn, radiate an energy infusing them with faith, strength, and courage to carry on an eternal circular voyage on earth. A voyage that we invite you to embark on, in a Sanctuary Frozen in Time.

This exhibition is an invitation to travel into the past, to journey here on earth in a space akin to the expanse of the universe—a vast domain of ephemeral nature, that no god, no force, or law can govern, and that no atlas can contain. A space where time elapses in light years or eternities while we count in seconds.
For the duration of this journey, in this sanctuary, we offer you the gift of time. Within this space, time cannot be measured or tamed; it is absent. Here, time, the immemorial custodian of life and death, will shelter you from its inevitable course.
What better then to dream of eternity, in space, where time does not pass by?

Welcome to Mongolia where the land is virgin, unspoiled, as if just birthed by the universe.
A sanctuary frozen in time where nomads signed a pact to live in harmony with the natural world, settled to live of nothing other than the fruits of mother nature, removed from civilization and time—a land where they reunite with the fourth dimension.

Born from the cradle of civilization, 2023

2600 BC, domestication of horses and Bactrian camels, Altaï, Mongolia

They see so many horizons, dawns and dusks, and drink so much from the spring of light that in them burns a flame fuelled by faith and courage which will carry them serenely on their last journey.

The first history book, 2023

The Gobi valley of writings, West Olzïit, Dundgovi, Mongolia

Petroglyphs of the bronze age.
Animals and humans united here in the rock art of our prehistory, as in the symbolism evoked by the rites and cults, the objects, the statues and above all their shapes and decorations. This proves that steppe man lived and still lives in harmony with the terrestrial and the celestial world, both through his actions and his spirit.

The genesis of writing and book, 2023

Upper Tsagaan gol valley, Altaï, Mongolia

Paleo rock art, bronze age.
Back to the stone age when man hunted snow leopards with a crossbow and recorded life on rocks.

Pilgrimage in sacred land, 2023

High Altaï valley, Mongolia

It is here, where they were born, like their ancestors, where nothing counts except the simple happiness of being, that nature safeguards the good, free, true man, indifferent to time which runs and passes by… elsewhere.

Humility, 2019

Buuratyn valley, Hovsgol, Mongolia

A land where in the space of the immensities of light years, as cosmic dust in the universe, man learn what is humility.

Hunter gatherer frozen in time, 2005

Reindeers territories, Taïga, north of Hovsgol, Mongolia

Where the fruit of hunting, fishing and picking offered by nature feed the nomads ever since man came upon Earth, without our science, our GMO seeds and without our ignorance.

Oasis lost in time and wildlife sanctuary, 2018

Tsagaan Burgas oasis, Shar desert, Govi Altaï, Mongolia

Fortunate are free men who refuse to be harnessed by society, wandering savage and unbridled. Wandering the land, like clouds or the wind, or as birds suspended in the air. Wandering without stopping or coming to earth, in a world which every man would wish to travel because it has no barriers, no frontiers. But man lives on earth and cruel reality brings to ground that which can only be reached in a dream.

Sanctuary frozen in time, 2023

Upper Tsagaan gol valley, Altaï, Mongolia

There is on Earth but one single unique space where the human, the animal, and nature live and pass on forming a single and simple family whose harmony questions the folly of our plodding decadence.

Faith, willpower and courage, 2023

Upper Tsengel valley, Altaï, Mongolia

They are born just as they pass, from dust to nothingness, humble and tiny travellers covering the vastness. Their walls are the space, their windows the horizon coloured by the weather and the four seasons.

Guardians of the empire of the blue Türk, 2023

Anthropomorphic statues, circa 550 AD, Shiveet Uul Valley, Altaï, Mongolia

Where the shamanist man has left here and there over the millennia – on tombs, in caves, on top of mountains – material representations of other worlds. Stones with strange shapes, cut or chiselled with his rites and cults dedicated to nature and the spirits of the place. Deer stones, sort of megaliths of psychopomp animals, linking the underworld with the celestial one; the anthropomorphic statues of the blue Türk era, guardians of the slab graves, under which, buried, rests, who knows? Princesses? Who were beautiful... But perhaps bloodthirsty when we know that executioner of men’s heart, kings competed to conquer them while exterminating here an entire dynasty and there a whole empire! Stones then raised into mounds, these kurgans, which reveal, on the steppe, the sacred places where these armies were buried.

At dawn of the world's genesis, 2005

Taïga territories, at the border with the Republic of Tuva, North of Hovsgol, Mongolia

In this sanctuary of the original land, where no man lives and nature governs, you have the feeling of being in an earthly paradise that an unknown power would have put under sequestration, as if a god had banished all creatures, so that it would remain eternally pure.

Springtime, 2011

Hyargas lake, Uvs, Mongolia

Shepherdess of your flock and of eternity, will you be the heiress of our humanity; the guidance of our truth and of those simple values from the past which today, in the city, are scorned by our society?

On the road to freedom, 2005

Horidol Saridag range, North of Hovsgol, Mongolia

Life is a circular journey on earth, not a line in the space of time; time is as limitless as the dream of man is endless and thus leads nowhere.

The pride of the Mongols, 2023

Tsengel Hayrrhan valley, Altaï, Mongolia

The legendary Mongols horses whose exceptional strength helped Gengis Khan to conquer the world.

Spring migration, 2012

Sulin Adag desert, Zavkhan, Mongolia

This is where from nothing but the Earth, and out of which all emerges and ultimately all returns, the nomads and the wildlife share the space to live in harmony.

No man’s land, 2016

Great Gobi A nature reserve, Bayanhongor, Mongolia

They are born as shepherds and nomads with no roots other their own land. Guardians of their flocks, of an immense emptiness, they live from life itself. They live from that which a benevolent and unrestrained nature has placed in their hands to endure at their hunger and in their hearts to do good.

Migrating greylag geese , 2019

Delger Moron river, Hovsgol, Mongolia

The greylag goose used to be a sacred bird, linked to Ishtar, goddess of fertility 5000 ago, and associated to Aphrodite, goddess of love. Its fat was used as an aphrodisiac in Greek and Roman times.

The hourglass of lost time, 2017

Hongor dunes, Omnogovi, Mongolia

Where everything was dust under which, in oblivion, time seemed to have been buried, ever since its clock, however inexorable, no longer ticked by hours, but simply sand.

Twilight fires of the Cretaceous, 2022

Hermen Tsav, Omnogovi, Mongolia

The end of the world, or Cretaceous formation where the first dinosaur skeleton was unearthed in 1923.

Triassic tree stump frozen in time, 2017

Oosh desert, Dundgov, Mongolia

Earthly chaos under cosmic order.

Twilight of times, 2016

Bayan Toroy oasis, Shar desert, Govi Altaï, Mongolia

As naked as though it had just left the universe’s womb, the earth has remained unspoiled, time has returned to nature, there, removed from civilisation, the nomad re-joins the fourth dimension.

On the sanctuary's holy path, 2023

Upper Tsagaan gol Valley, Bayan Ulgiy, Altaï, Mongolia

With no other needs than to live and to eat, the nomad, travelling light, is the example and symbol of true freedom; the proof that one can live from simplicity.

Moon dusts, 2017

Sand dunes of Zulganay, Bayanhongor, Mongolia

All alone, there, in the middle of a desert and the nothingness, I was a happy man. Lying under the astral light, I liked being the infinitesimal dust that was once born as nothing much, who knows why? But for which other cause than the simple desire to live, as a nomad with no borders, no limits other than those of heaven and earth, within which I could travel, free in nature and be lodged.

Heaven’s gate, 2016

Gobi desert of Oosh, Dornogov, Mongolia

Sanctuary where the candles of hope burn since the dawn of time

Spiritual journey in the light years, 2015

Erdenetsogt valley, Bayanhongor, Mongolia

Source of divine light, and sanctuary for the peace of mind.

The spatial exploration, 2014

Zavkhan province, Mongolia

When nothing but earth, heaven and nature are the companions of your days and nights, then life is a wonderful journey into the immensity of true freedom.

All projects

Cretaceous

Project in progress. More information to come soon.

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