CHANGING Realities

© Heiko Hellwig Surfrider

In recent years, Europe has shown itself mainly as a Europe in crisis. However, it is interesting to tell the many other stories: those of the small utopias and grand visions which have been implemented in everyday life. Crossing borders, photographers go in search for traces of this other Europe.In their works we encounter people who are facing the current economic and social challenges with courage and creativity. Beyond traditional western lifestyles and consumption habits, they are generating models for sustainable living in a globalized world.

Alternative housing concepts, the careful use of natural resources, renewable energy and organic farming, humane migration policies, a globally equitable distribution of wealth, and the protest movements of civil society mark turning points along the way. In the course of the 6th European Month of Photography, from October 21 to November 3, 2014 the exhibition CHANGING Realities at the Alexanderplatz subway station presents twenty photographic positions with exceptional aesthetic visual solutions. On billboards – usually altars of Western consumer society – they create a surprising space for art and thus represent not only an exhibition but also an artistic intervention in public space.