4		 Not forgetting. Bearing witness. Being vigilant and modest. A small book by Paris-based Japanese photographer Keichi Tahara Les Anges de Croatie (Croatia's Angels), embodies these qualities to which we may add impeccable design and sequencing and the sense that the author has a story to tell. His images carry the damp smell of churches, the light reflected through stained-glass windows, the slight giddiness and exhilaration experienced by the foreigner after drinks offered by the local priests, and above all his sense of wonder.    
        Samobor. Franciscan church of l'Assomption-de-la-Vierge, Sainte-Lucie, 1735. Photo Keihi Tahara  
 

For two years, Tahara has traveled to baroque Croatian churches and monasteries which reflect a mixture, unique in Europe, of Italian, Austrian and Hungarian cultures as well as Greek Orthodox, Moslem and Catholic religions.

While Tahara was visiting a small church on the Smarje hills, about thirty miles from Zagreb, an old theologian told him that only when sun and clouds mix do angels show their faces.

But many among those churches have been destroyed by bombing. Writes Tahara: "Where do they now wander, these angels who have lost their sanctuary?"

 
        ...part of a group of humanistic photographers...  
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