The premise of India Desjardins’ latest album is not encouraging: “Whales fascinate me because they are the oracle that announces the end of a world where they can exist. Lucid, she is therefore busy “paying homage to them, before they disappear”. However, while the prolific author recognizes their tragic destiny, she offers them here a requiem as mysterious and bewitching as the song of this fascinating marine mammal. More than a documentary, Whales and us is a meeting, which navigates between editorial, science and storytelling. The result is a captivating, instructive and moving immersion. Hats off, too, to Nathalie Dion, whose illustrations in variations of blue reflect, despite the limitations of the page, the immensity of mammals. A striking ode inviting us to seize the present: “There is nothing spectacular about a whale’s back. Still, it is beautiful, simply because the whale is still there. “
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