Agonie — Antoine d’Agata & Rafael Garido (signed)

This signed copy of Agonie, a collaboration between photographer Antoine d’Agata and writer Rafael Garido, published in 2003 by Actes Sud and Atelier de Visu, is part of the Darwin Bookshop because it marks an early and intensely physical convergence of text and image—where language breaks under the weight of the photographic and vice versa.

Bound in black faux leather with minimal white type, the object evokes a dossier or morgue file. Inside, d’Agata’s images unfold in fevered grain: bodies blurred by movement, consumed by shadow, lit by narcotic or sexual tension. Garido’s text—poetic, incantatory, shattered—echoes this descent, not as commentary but as accomplice. This is not a book that explains—it suffers.

Published in Marseille and part of the Atelier de Visu’s experimental output, Agonie belongs to d’Agata’s early 2000s period, when his work left behind narrative and plunged into embodied darkness. The formal choices—rounded page corners, glossy black cover, and unbound text blocks—amplify the sense of erosion and intimacy. Signed by d’Agata, this copy is held at Darwin as a rare threshold object: the moment when photography stops being observational and becomes existential.

Technical Sheet

Title: Agonie
Artists / Authors: Antoine d’Agata, Rafael Garido
Date: 2003
Technique / Printing Method: Offset
Medium / Materials: Hardcover, leatherette cover, rounded corners
Dimensions: approx. 17 × 23 cm
Language: French
Pages: 96
Publisher / Editor: Actes Sud / Atelier de Visu
Signed: Yes
Condition: Near fine