A man in Indonesia looking in terror at the ruins of his house that a local militia has burnt down to clear the way for a palmoil plantation. Passengers on a Japanese cruise ship reading the results of their presidential election with a two-day delay. And two women in Rwanda who, after their husbands were killed in the 1994 genocide, cultivate their rice paddy together. Most of these single photos show decisive moments in people’s daily lives which point at larger stories.
BORDERLANDS (series)
Along the US-Mexican border, immigrants die nearly every day – from heat, cold or mysterious head injuries. Many fear that a fortified border wall as proposed by Trump would push them to cross in even more dangerous ways. As these photos show, the Sonoran Desert and its settlements become increasingly polarized between people who support immigrants and others who fear them or even hunt them down.
A TREASURE IN THE FOREST (series)
The Paharia, one of the smallest indigenous (Adivasi) groups in India, live from the little their forest provides them: wild roots, tubers and river crabs. They are proud of their heritage and knowledge which allows them to survive in such a remote place. But their lives are threatened as debt-collectors are logging more and more trees, thus also destroying uncultivated food.
HOLI MOLI (series)
Close to 100,000 Indians live in the Silicon Valley alone, according to the Migration Policy Institute. They constitute one of the largest expat communities on the US West Coast – and they brought their celebrations such as Holi, the Festival of Colors.
SUDDENLY SILENCE (series)
In late 2015, 300 refugees moved into the village Wadersloh in Westphalia within a few months. Among them a tailor from Aleppo, a Christian family from Iran and 40 men crammed into a house, who share hardly anything in common except the sorrows for the families they had to leave behind. I established contacts with 33 of them and photographed their first steps in the strange country: their longing, boredom and new beginnings.
