The neighbour, his ex and the owner of the laundrette
Images from the Indische Buurt, Amsterdam
'An unbearable situation escalates with death', screams a headline in de Volkskrant one morning in september 2006. And furthermore: 'Growing unrest in the Indische Buurt in Amsterdam after a deadly knifing. According to the residents, the neighbourhood is controlled by scum fighting over drug dealing territories'. Printed media and TV, pouring superlatives, have ethnic groups pitched against each other while competing gangs are terrorising the community.
From my window I walk to the television and back. I ask myself if I am looking at the same neighbourhood that they are talking about.
For the past two and a half years, I have been taking photographs in the Indische Buurt in Amsterdam. With these photos, I reflect on the current, often biased formation and representation of images as in the media.
I wasn't searching for a story with a beginning and an end, but I was trying to capture the atmosphere that characterises the neighbourhood for me. A sequence of moods and emotions, alternating day and night. A neighbourhood built out of moments, places and encounters. We look and think in subconsious patterns and prejudices cloud our perception, passing what we already know - or do we?
"..het fotoboek waarmee de jonge fotograaf Maarten Tromp (1980) in een klap een klassieker op de wereld schopt..
..Juist de manier waarop hij het gevoel van ongerustheid combineert met het poëtische straatleven maakt zijn boek tot een monumentaal document van het grotestadsleven aan het begin van de 21e eeuw.”
– Arno Haijtema, de Volkskrant 27.11.2008
*Credits Magazine / Talent 01.2009 by Fabian Takx [download pdf] [www]
*De Volkskrant 27.11.2008 by Arno Haijtema [download pdf]
*Tijdschriftrosa.nl 09.10.2008 by Erik Schumacher [www]
*NRC Handelsblad 05.09.2008 by Karel Berkhout [download pdf]
*Het Parool 16.08.2008 by Corrie Verkerk
*PhotoQ.nl 13.07.2008 by Han Schoonhoven [www]
*Contrast Magazine 06.2008 by Samatha Bechan
VPRO's de Avonden 05.11.2008
Radio 6, Beeldende kunst-halfuur
Interview by Gijsbert van der Wal
[Listen here]
Design Het IJzeren Gordijn
190 x 245 mm Sewn, softcover
152 pages, 69 photos
Dutch / English
ISBN/EAN 978-90-8690-181-4
Limited Edition
50 copies are numbered 1/50 to 50/50
and sold with a handmade print (160 x 240 mm)
Price EUR 100,-
The book is for sale at all of the better bookshops.
It can also be ordered by sending me an email.
Shipping within the Netherlands is for free.
Price EUR 25,- (Incl. 6% VAT)
