June 6, 1944, the landing in Normandy, a date that is history. But what remained on the beaches of the war? What does a grain of sand know about death?

Weber’s grandfather was one of nine commandos who had a specific mission to collect sand samples over New Years 1943. It was a secret mission to sneak onto the proposed landing beaches and bring back samples to be analyzed by scientists. At the end of the story he told his grandson, he opened a small wooden box, and unwrapped a small glass tube from a white linen cloth. it contained a pinchful of grey sand. “This is what we bought back”

Stirred by the story, 70 years later, Donald Weber (together with writer Larry Frolick and physicist Kevin Robbie) collected samples on the coasts of Normandy and discovered that traces of bones, steel, titanium, iron were still on the beach and today, smoothed by the sea and the wind, make up 5% of the sand.

For 4 and a half years, Weber returned to the scene and photographed it in every way, in various weather conditions and seasons, until he hired a drone that took on giant aerial visions. The sea, the clouds and the infinite numbers are confronted with the contingency of history, war and death. An immersive experience in the collective memory of history, accompanied by melancholic photographs of the sea, texts, old Hollywood films, dioramas and drones, private post-war memories … that are intertwined in a visionary narration.

Over the weekend, Weber will teach the workshop ‘Grant Writing‘. The workshop is sold out, you can sign up in the waiting list.


Event informations

Prior to photography, Donald Weber originally trained as an architect and worked with Rem Koolhaas’ Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. He is a photographer whose work explores the infrastructures of power in conjunction with the shadow states of globalized violence: societal, cultural, and economic.
Weber is the author of four books. His first, Bastard Eden, Our Chernobyl, won the photolucida Book Prize and asked a simple question: what is daily life actually like, in a post-atomic world? Interrogations, about post-Soviet authority in Ukraine and Russia, has gone on to much acclaim; it was selected to be included in Martin Parr and Gerry Badger’s seminal ‘The Photobook: A History, Volume III.’ Barricade: The EuroMaidan Revolt, is about the smoking language of revolution, made in collaboration with Ukrainian photographer Arthur Bondar. His latest, War Sand, tells the story of D-Day, from myth to micron.

WAR SAND
talk and booksigning on Friday, March 9 at 7pm 
free entrance

Micamera
Via Medardo Rosso
19, 20159 Milano