The Beauty of the Fragile
This series was captured along the streets and sidewalks near the town of Burg in the Spreewald Biosphere Reserve. A landscape unique in Central Europe, featuring the natural and artificial waterways of the Spree River, along with its wet meadows, farmlands, and near-natural lowland forests. After a light rain, as the sun set low in the sky during the last days of December, strikingly dark lines glowed on the asphalt—a mixture of sand, gravel, and grit blended with bitumen. Cold asphalt had been used in many places to repair cracks and potholes in the road surface.
The striking patterns were reminiscent of the Japanese art of Kintsugi. An art form, which joins broken porcelain objects with special lacquer and gold powder, thereby highlighting not only the fragility but also the beauty of the fragile. After all, the light from the “golden” sunbeams, falling at a shallow angle onto the darkly glowing fillings, has created patterns resembling graphic images and mysterious symbols.