Video: The World of Officials and the Officials of the World in Ian Benning's Photo Project
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
"Culturology" has already written about such international endeavors as the documentary photo project "Where Children Sleep" and a series of photographs "Girls and Their Rooms". This time we propose to look where you usually really do not want to go - to government agencies. Photographer Ian Benning will take us out of line to the offices of minor officials, whom we have all encountered more than once, and will show us what public places look like in different countries.
A century and a half ago, the famous traveler in the Russian outback Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov, upon arrival in the city, first of all paid visits to the local authorities. He had economic reasons for that. Dutch photographer Jan Benning has artistic and educational interests. A long journey around the world of officials formed the basis of the collection of photographs "Bureaucracy" and the exhibition of the same name.
57-year-old Jan Banning from the Netherlands is a historian by training, but he has not parted with a camera for 30 years. His educational works at the intersection of art and journalism are not disdained by the largest museums and galleries, and even newspapers and magazines, eager for beautiful pictures, are completely torn off with their hands. The main issues that interest Ian Benning are state power, the world of officials and abuse of office.
In addition to his native Dutch, Jan Benning is fluent in English, German, Spanish and French and can pronounce a couple of phrases in Portuguese and Indonesian. So finding a common language with representatives of government agencies from different countries was not at all difficult for him.
“The 50 photographs that make up the Bureaucracy project created the heart of an anarchist, the mind of a historian and the eye of an artist,” says Jan Benning, a researcher of the world of officials who is one in three persons. "The result is a comparative photo-analysis of culture, customs and symbols of state institutions and their employees."
During a photo hunt for world officials, the author of the "Bureaucracy" project traveled to 8 countries, having visited 5 continents. Ian Benning's cognitive works evoke various emotions: from a sneer at the decoration of offices to sympathy for people lost in a paper maze.
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