The first pages of the book are disconcerting: a series of silent photographs, with no apparent context. A curious encyclopedia of stranded balloons? A collection of surrealist stagings? The texts inserted in the last pages give us a different perspective.
When Germany was separated from the GDR, on certain windy days, balloons launched from the West crossed the border.
Timing, wind observation, trajectory prediction, landing conditions… Ballons is a diary-like juxtaposition of images and texts from the archives of the Stasi, which catalogued these carefully planned clandestine attempts to use balloons to drop leaflets, books and magazines across the border.
A documented and poetic work on this little-known episode in history.
22 x 32cm
