Josef Koudelka: The Black Triangle

[Schewe]

Interesting rather dark environmental photos...

Josef Koudelka: The Black Triangle
Josef Koudelka’s powerful black and white panoramas of the Black Triangle bear witness to the environmental destruction of this Czech border region

The panoramas of Podkrusnohori, located at the western tip of the infamous Black Triangle, which fill the pages of Josef Koudelka’s seminal photobook of the same name, capture the barren landscape of his homeland. This photoessay marks the first time Koudelka returned to the Czech Republic after the global publication of his photographs of the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968 compromised his safety. Ravaged by open-cast mining since the fifteenth century, Koudelka’s images offer a record of the immense and irreversible environmental damage inflicted by man on this region, located between Germany’s southern Saxony, Poland’s Lower Silesia and the Czech Republic’s northern Bohemia in the foothills of the ore mountains.

Actually MAGNUM Photos is a site worthy of a visit from time to time to see what's new...

[LesPalenik]

Thank you for the links, Jeff

Sadly, Podkrusnohori wasn't the only destroyed region in the former Czechoslovakia. There were other regions there that were heavily damaged either by reckless mining or by chemical pollution from many dirty factories, typically located on the rivers. Before the heavy industrialization, there were many coniferous forests, but they were all annihilated by the industrial pollution.

The photographs taken by Koudelka in early nineties are important documentaries of that destruction and captured at the peak of the industrial exploitation. After 1990, some of the most polluting activities were halted, but it took several years and a lot of confusion after the "velvet revolution" before the government initiated a gradual rehabilition of the "moon landscape" area. Fortunately, the region looks much better and healthier today (see the pictures in the link below).  There are many new lakes, forests, and recreational areas, even some vineyards. It seems that the coniferous trees disappeared for good, most forests there today consist of deciduous trees and are home to wide variety of animals, birds, and plants.

Northern Bohemia Today

[RSL]

Thanks, Jeff. Koudelka long has been one of my favorites. Check his Gypsies and his work on the 1968  Czechoslovakian invasion in his Nationality Doubtful to see why.

[Paulo Bizarro]

Thanks for the heads up.