Jessica Backhaus was born in Cuxhaven, Germany, in 1970 and grew up in an artistic family. At the age of sixteen, she moved to Paris, where she later studied photography and visual communications, and where she met Gisèle Freund in 1992, who became her mentor. In 1995 her passion for photography drew her to New York, where she assisted photographers, pursued her own projects and lived until 2009.
Regarded as one of the most distinguished voices in contemporary photography in Germany today, Jessica Backhaus has shown her work in numerous solo and group exhibitions, published different books and is featured in numerous prominent art collections. Presented here is a series of images from her project “Jesus and the Cherries”, published in 2005, documenting everyday life in the Polish province of Pomosrskie, where the artists has spent a total of three and a half years portraying the residents of Netno town.
She shows people in their apartments, at work, and in the untouched Polish landscape. With a sure eye and an unusual colour language, she points out important but easily overlooked details: plastic flowers and crocheted pillowcases, images of saints and lace doilies, and cherries preserved in mason jars. The pictures are neither intrusive nor tactless; she encounters people with dignity and full of admiration for the way of life of Poland’s rural population. The intimate character of the photos suggests a special relationship to the subject: we feel the warmth, cordiality, and authenticity with which Backhaus was received in Poland. Jessica Backhaus thus tells a tale of traditional ways of life that may already belong to the past.
