The book

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From Petrarch and Shakespeare till today, crazy love has always been one of the key themes of art and literature, and it has never stopped defining what love actually means. 286 Days is part of this tradition, which it reinvents in the most radical ways. The theme of 'man meets woman' produces here a co-authored work in which the desires, the voice and the gaze of both partners are not only gathered, but also assembled and intertwined, till eventually they fall apart. This book contains the blended diaries of a sexual and amorous passion, intense yet brief, which the couple in love documents in photography at the very moment they experience it. 286 Days explores a new language that makes the reader understand and feel what the couple in love is actually living: all the moments and nuances of the intimacy of a relationship. Raw, sensual, upsetting, 286 Days exceeds all known genres, as if the love exchanges effaced even the limits between oneself and the world.

286 Days is the culminating point of an approach that Frédéric Boilet initiated some twenty-five years ago with 36 15 Alexia and completed more than a decade ago with Yukiko's Spinach (translated in nine languages all over the world). An approach deeply rooted in the representation of desire, amorous feelings, and the mutual gift between the artist and his model. This new book offers the real-time chronicle of the love story the author has experienced with Laia Canada, a young Spanish artist, from the very first encounter till the final separation, from the erotic passion of the first days till the last tears. It is a film in print, a reportage filmed from a subjective point of view, a photographic and dramatically personal diary where the gaze of the man and that of the woman are increasingly exchanged, to the point that often their images and perspectives coincide. It is also an impressive declaration of love, which any reader, male or female, will easily recognize, even if he or she has never experienced love in such extreme forms. 286 Days is a crazily audacious book that tries to seize something impossible: the happiness of a particular moment, the body fever, the fragilty of a relationship and finally its absolute mystery. Yes, this book is raw, but it is also a work of infinite tenderness, far beyond any form of impudicity, and whose formal inventions will surprise the readers at every page.

The cover

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Some pictures...

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Discover an extract of the book by clicking here !

Frédéric Boilet presents 286 Days

The authors

Frédéric Boilet was born on the 16th of January 1960 in Epinal. From his first book on, Le Rayon Vert ("The Green Beam", published in 1987), he established a drawing technique that he still uses today and that is largely based on photography and video. 36 15 Alexia applies this technique to a story with autiobiographical undetones. After his encounter with Benoît Peeters, his work shifts to the narration of daily life stories, often very humorous: Love Hotel, Tôkyô est mon jardin ("Tokyo Is My Garden") and Demi-tour ("Turning Around"). In 2001 he publishes Yukiko's Spinach, which will be translated in nine language. After that he publishes three other "Japanese" books: Mariko Parade (in collaboration awith Kan Takahama, 2003). L’Apprenti Japonais ("The Japanese Apprentice", 2006) and Elles ("Women", 2007). For some ten years he served as a go-between between the world of mangas and the world of comics and bande dessinée. Frédéric Boilet leaves Japan at the end of 2008 and moves to the Vosges. Vivi des Vosges, a children's book made in collaboration with Aurélia Aurita, appeared in 2011.

Laia Canada was born in Mataró, on the 6th of September 1992. She is currently studying at Barcelona University. 286 Days is her first book.

The short film of Laia Canada Nothing's missing

"When there's nothing to say, there's always something to see indeed. That's what I want to keep when I close my eyes : how beautiful is life around you." (Laia Canada)

The technical details of the book

- 544 pages + end leaves

- format (horizontal) : 21,6 x 15,4 cm

- genre : picture story

- paper : Condat Silk 130 g

- presentation : hard back, full color

- copy run : 2000 copies (of which 100 deluxe copies, numbered from 1 to 100, accompanied with an ex-libris signed by the authors)

- release : January 2014 (the sending to the subscribers will be made in scoop, from December)

Consult the page of the book on Facebook and on the website of Les Impressions Nouvelles !

"286 jours" de Frédéric Boilet & Laia Canada