Damyan Doumanov

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Books

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Garden in Eden

published in 2025

208 pages
Hardcover
Edition of 3 (+ 2 AP)

Initiated in 2019, Garden in Eden is a long-term analog photographic project exploring the intersection of landscape, cultivation, and observation. Captured entirely on traditional black-and-white film in Sinemorets, a rural village situated on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, the project culminates in a meticulously crafted artist’s book that synthesizes visual imagery with original text.

The project’s conceptual architecture was rigorously developed through sustained mentorship and curatorial research with leading Bulgarian photography curators and editors. During this developmental phase, the work underwent a vital thematic shift. Through critical dialogue, a profound parallel was identified between the meditative acts of photographing and gardening—a conceptual anchor that ultimately inspired the project's title. The original texts featured within the publication emerged directly from these conversations, expanding the scope of the visual narrative.

To further contextualize the work, the artist participated in an immersive, week-long residency in Sinemorets hosted by a local collector. There, ongoing critical discourse with fellow contemporary visual artists and collectors helped to distill the project into its final, resonant form.

Translating this conceptual framework into a tangible objet d'art, the project materializes as an intricately constructed artist's book. The physical realization of the volume was executed in collaboration with master craftsmen at a premier print house in Istanbul. Maintaining rigorous control over the final output, the artist personally prepared the files, printed the folios, and bound each book by hand under the expert supervision of the atelier's team.