Valentin Mici

As part of the project, Valentin Mici presented an open-air photographic exhibition for which he took portraits of Sonnenberg residents in their everyday lives and had personal conversations about privilege, social inequality and solidarity. When he photographed a person and struck up a conversation with them, he immediately handed out an invitation to the exhibition with the promise of being able to pick up the print of the analogue black and white photograph, his own portrait. His aim was to make visible the often invisible social dynamics of a neighbourhood in which different realities of life exist side by side. The chosen location – a playground on Fürstenstraße – was deliberately chosen to symbolise equal opportunities and the negotiation of social values. The portraits were not just pictures, but also invitations to dialogue and expressions of appreciation. Valentin Mici’s working method shows how art can become a tool for entering into dialogue and directly negotiating social issues and assumptions.