MISTRAL
The Legendary Wind of Provence
Introduction by Bill Buford
Mistral, a 20-year project, is a portrait of Provence seen through its legendary wind. Photographer Rachel Cobb captures this invisible force of nature through its effects: a leaf caught in flight, a bride tangled in her veil, spider webs oriented to withstand the wind and grapes lashed by powerful gusts.
Published by Damiani
Designed by Yolanda Cuomo Design
British Journal of Photography
“Cobb’s new book, Mistral: The Legendary Wind of Provence, is a record of the 20 years she spent hunting the wind.”—Marigold Warner
National Public Radio’s All Things Considered
“To Capture French Region Of Provence, She Photographed The Wind”: an interview with NPR's Mary Louise Kelly.
Vogue.it
“Cobb manages to depict the unphotographable, capturing the effects of the wind, that moment ‘where the invisible becomes visible through what it touches.’”—Chiara Bardelli Nonino
LensCulture
“Mistral achieves the impossible. … I found myself lingering over the photographs, imagining the stories behind the shots. Mistral is among those great photobooks that provoke a creative imagining in the viewer’s heart and head. … Mistral is an entertaining, informed and wise photobook. If I were writing Hollywood hype, I’d use phrases like ‘instant classic.’”—W. Scott Olsen
Le Point
“Le livre qu’elle a tiré de ces jours et ces nuits passés à traquer le vent légendaire est spectaculaire, magnifique, poétique, limpide.”—Christophe Ono-Dit-Biot
The Guardian
“American photojournalist Rachel Cobb has spent several decades capturing the legendary wind that blows through southern France. This relentless force of nature that can gust to hurricane strength is an integral part of the fabric of Provençal life.”
Vogue
“A lifelong fascination with the legendary winds of the South of France has yielded a lush and vibrant book—a work that resonates with the intensity of the forces it seeks to capture.”—Chloe Schama
Musée Magazine
“Cobb’s shots reveal an invisible entity by capturing its brutal and sublime impact on the world around it. … The thoroughness of Cobb’s stylization, techniques, and chosen subjects in her photographs all work together to create a thorough and complex portrait of an invisible force.”—Adam Ethan Berner
Politiken
Torben Benner’s Dutch-language review of Mistral in Politiken.
People Magazine
“In beautifully evocative stills, a photographer captures the restless swirl of Provence's famous wind.”—Kim Hubbard
L’Oeil de la Photographie
A French-language discussion of Mistral by Rachel Cobb, featured in L’Oeil de la Photographie
Outside Magazine
“In her photos, which include windswept wedding ceremonies and scoured mountaintops, [Cobb] shows how the mistral impacts everything from attitudes to agriculture.”—Heather Hansman
