family Archive | malenki.net

To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India — Collectors Edition

Robert Schlotter — Thu, 07 Jan 2021 12:20:22 +0000

“I met Meena in 2006 when I first visited Mumbai. We chatted and took a picture. Back in Germany, I sent her our photo: To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India. The letter actually reached the homeless family. That was the beginning of our close friendship, which has now lasted 13 years. Together with Meena, an unusual woman full of energy and warmth, this book was created about her, us and her family.“ — Helena Schätzle

A colorful, lively book about a woman full of contagious soulfulness and love. Meena’s life story: with notes from her diary and photographs by Helena Schätzle.

Read an article (in German language) about To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India in Chrismon Magazine.

Der Beitrag To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India — Collectors Edition erschien zuerst auf malenki.net.

To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India

Robert Schlotter — Sat, 17 Oct 2020 07:28:11 +0000

A colorful, lively book about a woman full of contagious soulfulness and love. Meena’s life story: with notes from her diary and photographs by Helena Schätzle.

Read an article (in German language) about To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India in Chrismon Magazine.

Der Beitrag To Meena, Chowpatty Beach, Mumbai, India erschien zuerst auf malenki.net.

Looking for my Japanese family

Robert Schlotter — Mon, 03 Feb 2020 13:43:34 +0000

We were in a train in Japan when my mother told me about my grandfather who died before I got the chance to really meet him. She explained to me how he had a son with a Japanese woman in the 70s. She doesn’t know her brother’s exact age or where he lives. She doesn’t even know his name. That’s how I began observing the faces of those men, aged 40, sharing Japanese and European features and started hearing an increasingly strong voice in my head saying “This might be him!”. Since that day I wonder who my uncle is. What does he look like? What kind of life does he have? 3 years ago I decided to look for him!

Looking for my Japanese Family is the chronicle of this quest where reality sometimes gives away to fiction, and where the new narration becomes part of the family history. — Julie-Marie Duro

Der Beitrag Looking for my Japanese family erschien zuerst auf malenki.net.

Paul / Paweł

Robert Schlotter — Tue, 18 Dec 2018 21:25:04 +0000

Based on his own photographs as well as on family album treasures, Paul Koncewicz enfolds in PAUL/PAWEŁ his own family ties and gives us an unembellished, sensitive and empathetic insight into the everyday life of his binational family circle.

The German weekly newspaper DIE ZEIT writes about his publication:
“Photographer Paul Koncewicz takes the psychological term “family constellation” literally by working through his biography with PAUL/PAWEŁ: As a child of divorce, he moved to Germany with his mother while his father stayed in Poland.
Koncewicz later met his biological father as a student and began to photograph him both alone and together with him, just as he was already doing with his family in Germany; his archive of images of a constructed family history has been growing steadily ever since.
By retroactively depicting supposedly everyday scenes of family interaction, Koncewicz goes in search of his childhood, which despite all the breaks serves as an imaginary setting for points of contact.“

A strong publication — a strong family portrait that reveals something amazing: Two separate and at the same time united families, different and yet similar.

Der Beitrag Paul / Paweł erschien zuerst auf malenki.net.

The Queen of the Animals and the Most Beautiful Gardens

Robert Schlotter — Sun, 03 Dec 2017 13:12:58 +0000

When shown in West European news, Bulgaria (my homeland) is described as the poorest EU Member State, where about 1,6 million young people have left the country for lack of opportunities. The parents and grandparents who remain in the country are hoping their children will return someday.

Fifteen years ago, my sister and I immigrated to the Netherlands to be able to survive. Last summer our dear mother became ill. Our father, who shares his life with another woman, concluded: “Now you really have to come back home.” A friend of mine reacted with the words: “Maybe that’s why your mother is ill, because you left her alone.” To make up for the gap that opened in her life, my mother surrounded herself with animals rescued from the street. For her, they are my brothers and sisters. She says: “When you live with animals, you become one”, or, “I am half-animal and they – half-human.” Plants are also her passion, when no one else is around.

This project is a portrait of my homeland, Bulgaria, and my mother, at the same time. I am also asking from the position of a migrant what the moral relationship between me and my parents and homeland is; what it means to come back home; and where is home.

Der Beitrag The Queen of the Animals and the Most Beautiful Gardens erschien zuerst auf malenki.net.