A Sudden Gust of Wind (after Poly)
Photography Exhibition by Denis Gallen
Documenting fallen trees in the aftermath of storm poly in Amsterdam 2023
A Sudden Gust of Wind (after Poly) responds to the aftermath of Storm Poly, a severe windstorm that struck the Netherlands in July 2023, with hurricane-force winds causing widespread destruction. Rather than documenting the event as a news or journalistic report, the series reflects on the harm inflicted upon trees, centering them as living beings whose deaths are often overlooked in the human-centered narrative of such disasters. The photographs do not merely depict fallen trees but explore the quiet tragedy of their destruction and the ways people respond—or fail to respond—to these losses. For the artist, these images serve as a meditation on how we prioritize human inconvenience over the life and history embodied by trees, many of which had stood far longer than the people passing by them.
Denis Gallen is a photographer from Co Tyrone, Ireland, currently living in the Netherlands. As a photographer, his work resides between the conceptual and the sensorial, engaging with cultural and socio-political undercurrents that shape our surroundings.
