Terra Incognita by Juliet Taylor

The one and only thought that makes us survive the rough days of winter is that moment when we can finally lie down on golden sand and let the sun infuse our bones. Just hearing the sound of the sea and the blowing wind. Suddenly the soul leaves the body and we fall asleep. That is exactly when Juliet Taylor captures sleepy sunbathers on beautiful Bondi Beach of Sydney. The talented photographer has been working for this project, named Terra Incognita, for 6 months. Here ‘s the words by Taylor:

When I was thirteen I spent a month in the Philippines on a family holiday, A guy had said to me ‘people in the sea are ignorant’ in very broken English – I never knew what this meant but it’s stuck in my head for years. There is something about the sun and sand that trances people out. Maybe this is what he meant.

I was living in Bondi and used to run the promenade each morning. I would see these interesting shapes on the beach, I brought my camera one day and it started there. Nobody knew that they were being photographed it was totally spontaneous. I would scale the back end of the beach and when I saw something or someone interesting, I would slowly move in close to shoot. It was sort of like hunting. There was something about keeping a distance and seeing them more so as human sculptures. It felt important not to make a connection.

The images were shot over a period of about 6 months.Terra Incognita means “unfamiliar land” in Latin, I guess I was playing with this irony, given that Bondi Beach is one of the most iconic beaches in the world.