As son of a German mother and a British father who was born in 1947 in Northern Germany, emigrated from Germany to Switzerland in 1989 and maintains a second home in Italy, for me it’s about a national identity, not daily, but often.
Just when I’m still happy after twenty years to have escaped from the tedious German dreariness evenings on the German TV news; the pedantic Swiss media the next morning, with its ill-considered prejudice against foreigners turns me into a German patriot. Which at the same time, however, irritates me.
There are older black and white images from the time when I still lived in Germany, combined with colour photography that I make while visiting my native country. Work in progress.
André Gelpke 2010