EMSLAND IN BLACK AND WHITE

Pictures of a North German landscape from the 1960s by Gerhard Kromschröder

The photographs by the Hamburg-based reporter, who began his journalistic career in the Emsland region, are more than just a nostalgic visual chronicle of an idyllic landscape where time seems to stand still; for the *Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung*, they are “sensitive studies of the psyche of a landscape.” In his graphically austere black-and-white compositions, Kromschröder explored the rugged charm of the countryside and its people, while at the same time capturing the unexpected signs of change that emerged in the 1960s: the encounter between a combine harvester and a draft horse, the menacingly towering ship’s hull looming over shipyard workers, the marveling at new types of farm machinery, the first traffic light. And time and again, he demonstrates a keen eye for comical human situations.

After his time in the Emsland region, Gerhard Kromschröder served as deputy editor-in-chief of the satirical magazine *Pardon* in Frankfurt, as well as a correspondent and war reporter for *Stern* in Cairo and Baghdad. He has published numerous books on contemporary history and photo collections. He received the “Emsland Media Award” for “outstanding, critical, and inquisitive local journalism” during his time as a young editor in Papenburg and Lingen. In 2023, Kromschröder and his fellow journalist Hermann Vinke were awarded the Lower Saxony Cross of Merit on Ribbon “for their services to the Esterwegen Concentration Camp Memorial and their outstanding pioneering work in historically documenting the history of the Emsland camps.”