Hain

Cruising - the anonymous, consensual sexual encounter of mostly gay men in public spaces, began as a practice at a time when homosexual people could not come out and there were no public spaces in which they could express their sexuality. Parks and other urban spaces - one of the most famous examples being Berlin's Tiergarten - gave these people the opportunity to meet like-minded people, at least for a short time. For my photo project 'Hain' I visited Berlin's most popular cruising spots over a period of two years. The project created intimate shots of a Berlin that would otherwise remain hidden. In the photo series, naked bodies come together in idyllic natural settings; intimacy not only meets the publicity of the room in which it takes place, but also the gaze of the camera. The sexual thrill that attracts men not far from footpaths to the bushes in the park or by the lake seems related to the feeling of voyeurism that the viewers of the series of images feel. The situations captured in the photo series take place within a few minutes; In a sense, they are encounters of fate in which natural idyll meets physical intimacy.