The Palace

A philosophical approach to the methods and aspects of remembering - and contemplation on histories. Lange takes us on a journey beyond time and place.

From the publisher:
Mårten Lange’s The Palace is a book exploring the role of architecture as a repository for history, memories and emotions. The work is based around the concept of a memory palace – a technique developed before the invention of the printing press to memorise large amounts of information.

In a memory palace, the practitioner imagines rooms, doors and corridors, each containing an image or a passage of text. There can be fragments of real places, or the palace can be a constructed fantasy. The remembering process is then performed as an imagined journey through this space. In this book, Lange constructs his own labyrinthine structure, half in ruins, with hidden doors, winding staircases and a secret garden.

The 70 photographs in the book were made at archaeological sites and historic buildings, dating from antiquity to the Middle Ages. However, they are not documentations of these places, but fragments of a stranger whole. Rather than capturing a specific chapter of history, they offer a meditation on the enduring presence of the past.

The book also includes a list of cryptic captions, deciphering some images while blurring others, and inspiring the reader to look deeper and learn more.