Tobias Kruse – The Carlsberg

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01.12.2014

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“Tasiilaq has 2,000 residents and is the largest settlement in East Greenland – an extremely sparsely populated region. Twice a week, a propeller plane flies in from Reykjavik and lands on an ice runway; from there, a twenty minute helicopter ride completes the journey. There is virtually no other way to reach Tasiilaq.

We travelled to village in April, 2013, to do a reportage on the population, alcoholism and the lack of occupations in the region. Part of the project was to produce a portrait of the extreme sports mountaineer from Southern Tirol, Robert Peroni, who lives in Tasiilaq where he runs his own hostel. He hopes that his project might offer the local inhabitants a new perspective, but, even after many years, it is proving problematic. This is because the Inuit people have a very different view of life and, above all, of time: a word for “future” does not even exist in the language of East Greenland.

The expectations of West European holidaymakers often collides with this lifestyle. This meant that we too spent most of our time waiting: waiting for the few appointments we had planned; waiting for clear weather; waiting for a warm meal; waiting for the Northern Lights. During that time, we walked around a lot and, at some point, stumbled across the garbage dump outside the village.

The fjord where Tasiilaq lies is only ice-free for a few weeks each summer, and it is only then that supply ships can reach the harbour. It is also the only time when garbage can be picked up and taken away. This means that over the rest of the year a mountain of garbage accumulates on the outskirts of Tasiilaq – a mountain that is dominated by the green label of a certain Danish beer. So, we called it the ‘Carlsberg’.”

Tobias Kruse

Tobias Kruse was born in Mecklenburg, northern Germany in 1979. After moving to Berlin he first worked as a graphic designer before studying at the Ostkreuz School of Photography. He has been represented by the Ostkreuz Agency since 2011.

www.tobias-kruse.com

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