» Hitchhiker «
personal long-term projectBjörn always reminded me of Douglas Adams‘ The Hitchhiker‘s Guide to the Galaxy, in which it is said
that “any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against
terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with“.
Even after 50 years in the care system, Björn always knew where his towel was.
For Björn, the coolest person I have ever known
* 11.06.1958 † 07.05.2024
Björn is my cousin. His mother, my mother‘s half-sister, gave him away when he was young
because she suffered from psychosis. Since he was diagnosed as mentally disabled, he was then
placed in an institutionalised living environment for the first time. As a young adult, Björn
chose his aunt Ines, my mother, as his family. From 2007 onwards, I spent more and more time
with him and realised that he drew, wrote and photographed a lot – and rarely spoke. Just like me.
So that’s what we did, we took photos together and he would write and draw on them.
I am convinced that Björn could very well have remained part of society – with a better social safety net,
at a different time, and with a different knowledge of neurodiversity. Structural problems in the care
system and in dealing with ‘otherness‘ in our society have almost cost Björn his life twice, not to mention
his life quality. But his humour, which is also evident in his pictures, has always been unrelenting.
The project consists of Björn’s archive (loose photos, photo albums, letters, and drawings), the photos we
took together, and medical reports. In 2024, when we decided to create a book, I started archiving as much
of the material as possible. The selection and compilation of Björn’s pictures in this pdf was made by me
after he died in May 2024, shortly after we had got sarted.
In order to deal with my grief, I also began drawing on my photos. Björn’s drawings are in biros,
mine are pink and digital.
So perhaps this is a story about ‘being different’ and a self-determined life in the German care system
of the last 50 years. Above all, however, it is a declaration of love to my cousin Björn and to photography
as our form of communication.