Biography

Discussion

Hannes Wallrafen began to photograph as a highly motivated reporter who covered topics of injustice and socially unacceptable situations. After working for fifteen years as a photojournalist with this self-appointed task, he no longer wished to depend on random external factors. For this reason, in recent years he has evolved to become an all-round photographer who reverses the roles. Instead of limiting himself to actual events, Wallrafen meddles with a situation to present his own personal vision of reality.

Wallrafen’s career as a photographer begins in 1971, when venturing out with in the Bijlmermeer neighbourhood of Amsterdam with a friend who takes photograph. Unable to resist the temptation of testing out his own creativity, he borrows a camera. The medium fascinates him because it allows him to transform his emotions, e.g. his anger when it comes to social injustice, into meaningful images. Because he likes Amsterdam and wishes to pursue photography further, Wallrafen decides to enrol at the Rietveld Academy, where he is admitted based on his initial work. After an important formative year, he enters the academy’s photography programme. With Michel Pellanders, a student in the same year, Wallrafen works on projects such as a reportage about the NDSM shipyard in Amsterdam. In the early 1970s, the teachers at the academy support the general notion that little money is to be made in reportage photography. Consequently, the emphasis lies on studio work.

Hannes Wallrafen’s preference, however, lies with documentary photography. As yet involved in his study, he decides to take a reportage trip. Inspired by a series of articles on how socialism has been introduced in Tanzania, he flies there with little more than his 35 mm photographic equipment. Prior to this journey—as well in advance of his future travels to third-world countries undertaken on his own initiative—Wallrafen does major preparation work. He first marks out a trail using political texts, from which he draws up a list of points for his story and collects data for a plan of action. The anger that motivates him to photograph socially unjust circumstances goes hand in hand with a feeling of solidarity, allowing him to depict people always while preserving their dignity. In the process, he tries to fit as much as he can into one image. Sometimes he crams his rectangular images completely full of information; in other cases, an occasional subtle gimmick is concealed in a simple compositional arrangement. Wallrafen works in a focused manner, but never allows himself to be entirely influenced by his direct observation. He sees himself as a photojournalist and feels his photos require a written text: by combining text and image, the message concerning injustice has a greater impact. In most cases, his photo reportages are furnished along with a script of his own on which the magazine’s copywriter can base his story.

The crisis in Northern Ireland holds Wallrafen’s interest. In 1979, he decides to publish the H-Blok/Armagh Bulletin with this region as its topic, in which he clearly expresses the dehumanising events occurring there in text and images. With the same sociopolitical motive, he travels to India, Vietnam, Chile, as well as other ‘battlegrounds’, in order to capture what he sees in telling images. Wallrafen always has a feeling of moving from one theatre to the next. This schizophrenic situation in which he finds himself can sometimes be confusing. After all, the event taking place in front of his eyes—such as a mass demonstration—is the harsh reality in which he, as a spectator, plays a part. While taking photos, however, it then becomes a scene from which he momentarily removes himself.

By the early 1980s, Wallrafen is one of several photographers who frequently run into each other on the street at political events, squatters’ demonstrations, and evictions. This ever-evolving group likewise meets regularly at an Amsterdam café or someone’s home to discuss social documentary photography. Together they philosophise and work on collaborative publications. This leads to idealistically conceived publications, such as Het feest dat Wiegel wilde (‘The Party that Wiegel Wanted’, 1980), on the topic of Queen Beatrix’s coronation, and Mijn moeder vindt het ook (‘My Mother Thinks So Too’, 1982), about the peace movement. Another product of this collaboration is ultimately the magazine Plaatwerk (‘Plate Work’). Several photographers from the group, including Hannes Wallrafen, Lex van der Slot, Han Singels, and Hans van den Boogaard work together on a publication of the ‘Studium Generale’ of the University of Groningen, entitled Sociale Fotografie (‘Social Photography’).

In the 1970s, photojournalists such as Willem Diepraam, Hans van den Bogaard, Hannes Wallrafen, as well as many others are working with 35 mm and applying the standard high contrast coarse-grain technique. Wallrafen is not consciously inspired by others, yet there is no denying a mutual influence shared by contemporary colleagues. Through a more austere design, a shot’s climactic moment becomes more powerful during this period. By either intentionally applying or excluding aesthetics, Wallrafen highlights the individual character existing in his work. Elements of form and line play less of a role then when compared to, for instance, the photos of Daniël Koning. With Wallrafen, a facial expression or gesture tells the story, possibly strengthened by the symbolism of a dove held captive, a row of soldier’s hats, or the violence of a jet of water. There is no place for blaring misery in his work, as encountered with Peter Martens. What we see is nothing more than life: plain, bleak, and impoverished.

A gradual shift in Wallrafen’s choice of subject matter after the age of thirty indicates his radicalism has been replaced by his astonishment at the strength that enables people to survive in difficult situations. This is to be observed in Wallrafen’s series Culturen van Minderheden (‘Cultures of Minorities’). He maintains his faith in photography as a means to influence people’s mindsets. At the same time, however, Wallrafen is no longer satisfied with the visual material dictated to him by the circumstances in which he finds himself: randomness too often plays a role and occasionally deprives his images of their expressiveness. Consequently, he increases his options by introducing artificial light. He also exercises a greater influence on the image itself by adding or removing what seems relevant to him. In doing so, he ensures a certain accuracy in his shots. These days, by experimenting frequently with studio techniques and large-format shots in colour, he obtains insights that also help him to enrich his 35 mm reportage technique. Wallrafen is learning to reconcile reality with playfulness and to manipulate that reality substantively.

The development that Hannes Wallrafen experiences in his photography runs parallel to that of other photojournalists of the 1970s who work with aesthetics. In the 1980s a remarkable shift occurs with respect to ideas concerning social photography. Disappointed by the expressiveness of the photographed moment, young reportage photographers begin to consciously seek a greater aesthetic in their photography. For a number of photographers belonging to the previous generation—including Taco Anema, Hans Aarsman, and Hannes Wallrafen—this shift leads to staged photography, usually executed in colour with technical perfection. Following a period of factual depiction, it appears as if a phase of imaginative representation has arrived for these photographers. The spontaneous emotion shown with regards to life’s harshness, as expressed with stark black-and-white contrasts, is now followed by a thoughtful composing of the image, in which the technical possibilities, e.g. the large format and brilliant colours of high-quality film material, are used to their full potential.

The same photographers devote special attention to the group portrait, as an example of grand-scale artistic direction. References to the staged group portraits shot by Paul Huf in the 1950s are clearly discernable. That Huf’s group portraits appear in the November 1985 issue of Plaatwerk is therefore no coincidence.

In the series of group portraits on which Wallrafen begins in 1986, he composes his image by positioning people according to a scene sketched in advance on paper. In the series De Verenigingen (‘The Associations’), he unites rather ordinary people in their free time. For group portraits photographed in Istanbul, Wallrafen has brought together people who work in the same profession, a concept conceived by Paul Huf in the 1950s for his portraits in the newspaper De Telegraaf.

The complicated scheme of Wallrafen’s current group photos takes him to areas of pure visual aestheticism. During these shots, a form of communication arises in which he figures as a director, narrator, and stylist. The photos no longer hold a compelling message, but function as a document of the present-day zeitgeist.

As a genre, the group portrait boasts a long tradition. While Wallrafen clearly approaches his portraits as a director, he still manages to preserve a liveliness reminiscent of painted Dutch group portraits of the seventeenth century—paintings that are natural in appearance, but as well actually based on carefully conceived compositions.

The strength of Hannes Wallrafen’s work lies in his analysis, interpretation, and registration of what moves people. He seeks those sources from which people draw vitality to carry on with their existential struggle and subsequently depicts them in a concise and intriguing manner. The cyclical motion of time is perhaps reflected in Wallrafen’s development: the revolt and unrest of the 1970s is transformed into a more stable pattern in the 1980s, in which the photographer has assigned himself an alternative role.

Documentation