By Christian Lange

My book, Lange Liste 79-97 is very dear to my heart. It is the result of my Masters studies at the Zurich University of the Arts during 2010 and 2011. I had a very good time there and I appreciate a lot of my Swiss friends and colleagues.

Lange Liste 79-97 documents the everyday life of my family using meticulously kept cash books. My mother gathered endless accounts of groceries, taxes, parties, leisure activities, clothes or presents with an exact price index over decades. To complement the cycle of this everyday life narratively, the first 18 years of my life - from 1979 to 1997 - were analysed and summarised in appropriate categories. Brief explanations and interviews with protagonists of the list illustrate important moments.

A series of family photos, pictures of products, certificates and receipts add to the family’s archive. With its 12,051 items, this book grants a detailed impression of the hidden desires, pleasures and losses of a family’s household kept in two different political and economic systems. It is the story of my childhood and youth in form of a housekeeping book. And it is a unique document covering everyday life during the late GDR and the German Republic shortly after unification.