Orig. softcover with dust jacket. Texts by Alexandra Urbanová, 45 photographs by Zdeněk Tmej. (Alphabet of spiritual emptiness)

"In September 1942 young Czech photographer Zdeněk Tmej was taken to a Nazi work camp in Breslau, Prussia (now Wrocław, Poland). He was forced to work at the train station loading and unloading. He had managed to bring two cameras with him and was able to photograph the daily life of the camp and its surroundings.
What makes this book particularly touching is the combination of Zdeněk Tmej’s sensitive visual approach paired with the striking simplicity of the book itself. His images are quiet, especially throughout the first part of the book. His photographs certainly do seem to reflect moments of spiritual emptiness, as he points his cameras at exhausted or sleeping male inmates, or into deserted corners of the rooms. His photography maintains that feeling even when he steps back to show entire interiors. He documents the simple things, such as resting, eating, or presents ‘still lives’ of meals. He captures the exhaustion in his inmates’ faces, as a sense of exhaustion spreads throughout the book: a silence or emptiness that gives the book its title. In the latter part of the book he shows also some images taken of exteriors. He also points his camera at visitors, and even the female inmates who were forced to prostitute themselves in a brothel specifically set up for foreign workers and visitors to the camp. Tmej handles all these subjects with a certain respect.
Tmej managed to escape the camp in 1944." (achtung.photography)

Pages: 164
Place: Praha
Year: 1946
Publisher: Nakladatelství Zádruha, a. s.
Size: 21 x 25 cm (approx.)

Included in "The Photobook: A History Volume I" by Parr/Badger
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Included in "Czech and Slovak Photo Publications, 1918–1989" by Manfred Heiting
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