Is the city still a dream? - PBF03 /
Leon Billerbeck
16 November to 20 December 2018
Leon Billerbeck, Paris Photo Carte Blanche winner 2017, evokes the city through the prism of the portrait of his brother, the successful city-dweller.
His series Foreign Landscape is a photographic project about the relationship between Léon Billerbeck and his big brother, a brilliant business consultant. The photographer gets in touch with ‘his’ everyday world, which he observes with a mixture of love and scepticism. He uses blurred images in his search to simplify elements which he sees as being too abstract.
“Our lives today revolve around the big global capital cities. We seek success and personal achievement, and we pursue an ideal of individuality, safety, and satisfaction. We strive to climb higher and higher because we can never have enough, we are constantly challenged by a competitive society which is all about efficiency. My brother is a thriving young business consultant for one of the biggest consultancies in the world, based in Frankfurt. At the age of barely 27, he is living his dream and achieving his career goals. He puts in an incredible number of hours every week and is devoting his life to his work, just like the rest of the city, where efficiency has become the only guarantee of safety. Is it the dream, or just an abstract illusion?”
