Rousset did this across more than a decade, resulting in a vast body of work which has now been assembled into the photographer’s first solo publication: Prabérians, published by Loose Joints. The book presents intimate portraits and collaborations with the people of Prabert, gathered in every corner of his family village. The images engage with deep rural traditions, simultaneously dignified and unconventional, mixing exaggerated scenarios with striking landscapes and naturalistic portraits.
“When you see my pictures, you don’t really know if it’s now or if it’s 20 years ago,” Rousset says, referring to the fantastical, hallucinatory nature of his images. The inspiration for this stylised approach comes, he says, from film – from the magic-realism of Emir Kusturica’s Black Cat, White Cat and the gothic works of Tim Burton. The latter’s trademark combination of the child-like and the unnerving can certainly be recognised throughout Rousset’s images: a confetti-covered lamb stares calmly into the photographer’s lens, a rope knotted around its neck. Two men sit at a table strewn with apples, contemplating a chicken that hangs limply from the older of the two’s hand. In another image, two men gaze intently at the wrecked remains of a car, as it burns in the midst of a forest.