This work is close to rough photography.
Tight registration of reality.
Professionally I am regularly in Germany with the car, sometimes with the motorcycle.
I take the bike for this project.
The bicycle allows you to progress slower and you have more time to absorb and experience the environment.
I take you to the Romantic Road, one of the most famous tourist routes in Germany, where thousands of photos are taken every day in the context of romanticism.
Starting from Würzburg on the river Main you cross the Bavaria to Füssen at the foot of the Alps.
The castles of Ludwig II are a must and everyone wants to see the Schloss Neuschwanstein.
The photos I take are not the ones you expect. And also your romantic sighs are not met. For the rest, these are images of this time, images that have to do with money and profit, images that completely contradict the life values such as health, correctness and aesthetics. Here youth is confronted with one of the most unhealthy temptations of our time.
Here the sometimes introvert side of the Germans was exposed. Nobody wants to talk about the omnipresent cigarette vending machines, placed on private proporties.
You would not expect it, the images are in themselves innocent, the series shown is less. A socially critical project that hopefully will not be seen again in a few years!
Even if this absurdity can also be funny!
This work was exhibited in September 2018
in art center Zebrastraat Gent / Belgium.
John Van Assel
