Mumbai Mehndi

I had the opportunity to embark on a journey to the roots of modern Henna Art for ZEIT REISEN magazine.

I faced a fascinating and at the same time truly amusing combination of modernism and tradition.

The most important Mehndi in a life of a women is the bright’s mehndi, which is beeing drawn by Mehndi artists on arms and legs in a hours long procedure. The Mehndi is not only a piece of jewelery, but it also forces a woman to relax during the stressful wedding preperations, to lay back and stop controlling the proceedings.

The Mehndi images show the women’s desires and dreams. Classic subjects are gods such as Krishna and Radha. Today there are new romantic ideas – Manga’s and Selfies decorate the arms of many modern Indian women.

Haltung zeigen.

In Zusammenarbeit mit der Werbeagentur Maas und ifp | Personalberatung, durfte ich ein fantastisches Projekt fotografisch Begleiten, in welchem 13 unterschiedlichste Persönlichkeiten aus der Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft sich mit dem Begriff „Haltung“ auseinander setzten.
Herausgekommen ist ein Buch in welchem sehr persönliche und individuelle Sichtweisen von Haltung und Führung besprochen werden.

Keeping composure

in cooperation with the add agency maas and the recruiting company ifp, i had the opportunity to photograph a range of thirteen very different business and social leaders, who reflected on the meaning of the idiom composure.

The result is a outcome book discussing very personal and individual perspectives on composure and leadership.

Goodbye farmer…

Getting up at 5:00 am every morning – looking after the cows. There is no sunday, day off or holiday in a farmers life…

I am going back every winter to a region in Germany called Allgäu where I spent several years of my childhood. Each year I see a new abandoned farm house.

I visited dairy farmers, who had been ruined by industrial agriculture and had to give up.
So far only 2 out of 10 dairy farms are still in business. Who delivers the milk today? Factory farming. Anything else appears to be too expensive, nobody is willing to spent more…

It is very likely, that in the state of Bavaria many of the 33000 existing dairy farms will have to close down. Since last year a farmer gets 30 Cent for a kilogramm of milk – which is 10 Cent less then the year before. Many dairy farms can’t even cover the costs for the animal food with their income.

It feels like a grey haze hanging over Allgäu’s snow covered landscape. Many farmers are born as farmers and remain farmers for their entire life.

But what happens, when there is no more need for what ones life stands for.

A melancholic last visit to a Germany that will soon not exist anymore.

Ragpickers

Von den 150.000 Menschen, die in Kalkutta hauptberuflich als Müll-Sammler arbeiten sind die meisten zwischen acht und zehn Jahre alt. Sie werden oft nicht sehr viel älter.

Sie sammeln, sortieren, entsorgen. Der Lohn ist das, was es für wiederverwendbare Rohstoffe gibt.

Das Müllsammeln ist durch die immer größer werdende Mittelschicht ein wachsender Markt, der streng von korrupten Gangs kontrolliert wird. Sie passen auf, dass jeder nur in seinem Gebiet sammelt und in der Nacht, wenn niemand guckt, füllen sie sich die Taschen in dem sie den Weg frei machen für Freier, die sich an den elternlosen Kindern und Jugendlichen vergreifen.

Wir waren auf einem Besuch bei starken Kindern, die uns nachdenklich machten…