Lasting, not lasting.

  • Dates
    2020 - Ongoing
  • Author
  • Locations Germany, Lower Saxony, Peine

In the small villages of Lower Saxony time froze 1000 years ago. Since then, the wheat grows on the fields, the thatch gets dried while the sun goes up and down again. The generations of farmers run by like the seasons, children are growing up and having children of their own. Where nature is near, death is still a part of life. The cats are still killing the mice, deer get shot, preserved and eaten.

And in all that romantic circle of life the modern age crawls in, swirling things around while the wheat still grows, and deer gets shot. The local pub which was there for hundreds of years closed because people don’t get out as much anymore, so it was turned into a living space. The crops are no longer eaten by humans but by the gigantic biogas plant nearby. A new generation is growing up in this environment captured somewhere between the old and the new.

This is a debate of change and time, exemplary of our cyclical history and how we may or may not disrupt it. In this sense, some things need to die for the next generation to bloom, because this is how it always has been. But are we rotating out of the seasonal stability with our modern ways? Are we on the point of eternal sunset, or is the sun coming up again tomorrow like she did in all the days before? Are we living the last summer days before an eternal winter?

This part of Lower Saxony are the villages around the city Peine, called Pain around 1130.

© Lara Wilde - 1000 Years Ölsburg, 1003-2003, a decorated monument.
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1000 Years Ölsburg, 1003-2003, a decorated monument.

© Lara Wilde - Deer heads, getting unfrozen for preservation. The hoarfrost on their eyes will fade quickly.
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Deer heads, getting unfrozen for preservation. The hoarfrost on their eyes will fade quickly.

© Lara Wilde - A family living on their property since 1450.
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A family living on their property since 1450.

© Lara Wilde - Fetching thatch form the fields in the evening. The wagon later caught fire because it was standing in the sun.
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Fetching thatch form the fields in the evening. The wagon later caught fire because it was standing in the sun.

© Lara Wilde - Image from the Lasting, not lasting. photography project
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Normally the family chicken get thrown into the trash, but this one survived for almost five years and laid close to 1000 eggs. It deserved a funeral.

© Lara Wilde - A young hunter protecting the corn from wild boar which multiplied extensively because of the corn.
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A young hunter protecting the corn from wild boar which multiplied extensively because of the corn.

© Lara Wilde - A family in their house from 1814. They joked about Napoleon walking by a few years ago.
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A family in their house from 1814. They joked about Napoleon walking by a few years ago.

© Lara Wilde - Thatch, rolled. In the background the house from the farmers window.
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Thatch, rolled. In the background the house from the farmers window.

© Lara Wilde - Image from the Lasting, not lasting. photography project
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A mouse, caught by the family cat, slayed by the family, because they could not stand the intense playing the cat had intended.

© Lara Wilde - A young couple looking after the horses, taking a rest at the water tank.
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A young couple looking after the horses, taking a rest at the water tank.

© Lara Wilde - A man taking a swim in the rain with his horse. He saved it from the butcher.
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A man taking a swim in the rain with his horse. He saved it from the butcher.

© Lara Wilde - A deer stuck at the fence of the disused hospital during mating season. He must have fought it for a while.
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A deer stuck at the fence of the disused hospital during mating season. He must have fought it for a while.

© Lara Wilde - There are not a lot of opportunities for a cosplayer to get out. This pirate stranded.
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There are not a lot of opportunities for a cosplayer to get out. This pirate stranded.

© Lara Wilde - Image from the Lasting, not lasting. photography project
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The closed mine in Klein Bülten is inhabited by the teenagers of the village. They still call their village “Lütchen Bülten” which was its Low German name; a language almost extinct today.

© Lara Wilde - Image from the Lasting, not lasting. photography project
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A young couple watching the stars. Later they wanted to look up some of the names of the stars they didn´t know. Using an app, they discovered the stars where actually satellites.

© Lara Wilde - A family living in the former pub that was once operated by their grandfather.
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A family living in the former pub that was once operated by their grandfather.

© Lara Wilde - A dung heap, the last place before the thatch gets later brought back to the fields for fertilization.
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A dung heap, the last place before the thatch gets later brought back to the fields for fertilization.

© Lara Wilde - Image from the Lasting, not lasting. photography project
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A family in their home, build in 1589. They moved in twenty years ago and are still called the new ones. There is a saying that in these villages it is getting really easy to be integrated into the community: it only takes three generations.

© Lara Wilde - A girl taking a rest at a monument from the second world war in the forest called Herzberg.
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A girl taking a rest at a monument from the second world war in the forest called Herzberg.

© Lara Wilde - Straw blowing from the fields back to the village. A sign that fall is coming and the summer is about to end.
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Straw blowing from the fields back to the village. A sign that fall is coming and the summer is about to end.

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