A photo exhibition about a blessed and cursed island

From certain points of view, the Philippines looks like a paradise, from others the exact opposite. The geological location within the Pacific's "Ring of Fire" causes intense volcanic activity, which, together with violent typhoons and heavy rainfall, quickly turns a sun-drenched, fertile land into hell. Natural disasters can hit everyone, but it is as always the people at the bottom of the social ladder who are hit hardest. It is their lives that are turned upside down when primitive residential areas are washed away by rivers, splintered by typhoons or rendered uninhabitable by volcanic ash clouds.

The Slum Blues photo exhibition portrays these people's living conditions. Neither to please or to romanticize - rather to embrace our own terms. And to tell about a population full of willpower, ingenuity and optimism.

The photo exhibition is produced in association with DIB's project work in the Philippines.


About the photographer

The pictures for Slum Blues were taken by Jørgen Nielsen, MA in the Nordic Language and freelance advertising and reporting photographer and journalist / photojournalist. He has, as a photographer, been behind a number of exhibitions with mainly nature photographs from Denmark and has also traveled with the camera in countries such as Nepal, Mozambique, USA and a number of European countries. 

Overall, his work sounds like visual poetry and the sense of seeking out the traces of the beautiful in the overlooked, and with his technical talent this makes the photographs a pure eye-catcher, writes Jannie Uhre Ejstrud, museum inspector and Ph.D.

Should the exhibition hang at your place?

The exhibition consists of 20 high quality A0 photographs and can be borrowed for a period of time. We like to come and participate in the setup. Maybe you could also think of a lecture on our work in the Philippines in the same vein? - It's all free!

All you have to do is contact DIB's secretariat at dib@dib.dk with a suggestion as to why the exhibition should visit you.

View and read about all the pictures and get more information about opportunities to experience and borrow the exhibition and sale of the pictures on the exhibition's own website www.slumblues.dk.