Above: Selected photographs from Albrecht Tübke’s series „Twins“ (1st row), „Personae“ (2nd row), and „Heads„.
Dandies against a Concrete Wall. Photographs by Albrecht Tübke
Val Williams
When Albrecht Tübke began to photograph people he encountered in the cities of Europe and the USA, he became part of a long tradition of documentary portraiture. Like his illustrious forebear August Sander, and more recent practitioners such as Judith Joy Ross and Rineke Dijkstra, Tübke has a gift for allowing his subjects to perform in their own solitary drama. „Many people„, he writes, „try to hide their emotions and feelings as they go about everyday life. This public persona is often calculated to mask what is within, creating a veneer of individuality, a fabrication to hide behind.“ (mehr …)