Exhibition “Forst” in Düsseldorf.
Documentary photography

Saturday, 10 September 2016, 14:00 to 20:00
Sunday, 11 September 2016 12:00 to 18:00
Where: Düsseldorf, Ellerkirchstraße 80
Admission is free!

The exhibition will be opened on Saturday at 15:00 with a welcoming address by Mayor Klaudia Zepuntke.

Documentary photographer Thomas Klingberg is presenting his social documentary photographic work “Forst” (Forestry) as part of Kunstpunkte 2016 in Düsseldorf, for which he accompanied forestry workers as they reintegrated into forestry work. The “Forst” area is a joint project between the City of Düsseldorf’s forestry department and renatec GmbH, a Diakonie subsidiary, which offers long-term unemployed people with life-long breaks the chance to regain a professional foothold.

Exhibition at the site of the event

The special thing about the documentary photography exhibition is that it takes place at the site of the event, namely on the factory premises, which has become a studio for the photographer, who dedicates himself to the genre of documentary photography as part of his artistic work as a photographer. Visitors can view the photographs during the exhibition amidst the smell of freshly cut wood, between machines and tools and in the presence of the workers. Some of the photographic locations can therefore be experienced and understood directly.

A documentary photographic work WITH and not ABOUT workers

For Thomas Klingberg, it was particularly important not to create his documentary photographic work from the perspective of an impassive observer from a distance. The series is intended to live from the photographer’s proximity to the working people and their surroundings, in order to bring viewers of the photographs into the scenes, so to speak. It should therefore be seen as a documentary with workers rather than one about workers.

“Just how successful the collaboration between Thomas Klingberg and the forestry workers was can be seen particularly clearly in the expressive portraits. Here the photographer shows faces full of life, which, precisely because of their photographic detachment, are a testimony to respect on the part of the photographer and great self-confidence on the part of the forestry workers.”
Susanne Schmidt, Berlin

A catalogue is available for the exhibition. Further information› here