Jacob Holdt - Pictures from America 1970 - 1975
Jacob Holdt spent five years in the 1970s photographing every stratum of US society.
Blacks and whites, multimillionaires and the poorest of the poor, murderers and prostitutes, human beings between hopelessness, drug addition, death, violence, and loving solidarity. His photographs and his unflinching view of human suffering still exert a powerful, shocking impact, even after over thirty years.
In his early twenties, Jacob Holdt (born in 1947 in Copenhagen) left Denmark, and set off for Chile via Canada to participate in the democratic revolution of Salvador Allende. But instead of arriving in South America, he hitchhiked for five years and a total of 160,000 kilometers through the USA, living from hand to mouth, struggling to survive with very little money, and relying on outside support.
In the ghettos of the USA, his interest grew in “Black America” and the living conditions black Americans experienced. Holdt thus became a participating observer, getting very close to the people he photographed—much closer than American sociologists at that time dared venture into the dangerous terrain of American ghettos.
As a result, Holdt produced about 15,000 photos between 1970 and 1975 that show the contradictions of the country in many different living situations – particularly how paralyzed blacks and whites appear in their craving for diversion. Through book publications and articles in magazines such as Spiegel, Holdt reached a broad general public after his return to Europe. Up to the present day, he also uses his photos to raise awareness and mobilize against poverty and racism. In his slide show lectures, he does not judge the US in itself but takes the country as an example of a kind of discrimination that can be found all over the world.
C/O Berlin presents the lecture on the occasion of Jacob Holdt’s shortlisting as a finalist for the “Deutsche Börse Photography Prize 2008.” The exhibition of his slides, together with photographs by John Davies, Esko Männikkö, and Fazal Sheikh will be on display in the Postfuhramt until July 13, 2008.
Lecture 11 . Jacob Holdt - Slide Show Lecture - Date Sunday, 6 July 2008 . 3 to 6 pm - Admission 12 Euro . reduced 10 Euro
C/O Berlin at Postfuhramt - Oranienburger Str / Tucholskystr . 10117 Berlin - www.co-berlin.com
