“Here are the young men, the weight’s on their shoulders, Here are the young men, well where have they been?” (Decades, Joy Division, 1980)
Beautiful black and white close-ups of Dutch soldiers from the 13th infantry company of the Royal Netherlands Marine Corps serving in Afghanistan. The rest is up to the viewer. What will you find in the eyes, the wrinkles - can you find traces of war, violence, fighting, loss of friends? A strong statement without making one, visually compelling and instead of presenting the triptychs you skim back and forth to watch the differences - You keep turning the pages in this book.
“The year is 2008 and my son Tristan has been sworn in as a marine. Following successful completion of the training, the next step is deployment into a warzone to gain some ‘real’ experience as a soldier. Nevertheless, this only natural ambition became the cause of my greatest anxiety: I couldn’t get rid of the image of two men coming to my door with that dreadful news all soldier’s mothers fear”. - text from book by Claire Felicie.
