India 17, 2003
Photographic giclée print
80 x 80 cm
Edition of 15
Price: Euro 15.000
Bureaucratics is the product of an anarchist’s heart, a historian’s mind and an artist’s eye. It is a comparative photographic study of the culture, rituals and symbols of state civil administrations and its servants in eight countries on five continents, selected on the basis of political, historical and cultural considerations: Bolivia, China, France, India, Liberia, Russia, the United States, and Yemen. In each country, photographer Jan Banning visited members of the executive in different services and at different levels. The visits were unannounced and the accompanying interviewer kept the employees from tidying up or clearing the office. That way, the photos show what a local citizen would be confronted with when entering. The project consists of a book (ISBN 978-1-59005-232-7, now sold out) and a traveling exhibition of fifty pictures that has already been shown in museums and galleries in over twenty countries on five continents.
