"If I didn't end up here after 43 detoxes and 17 rehabs I'd be dead now."
How does an approach to addiction therapy work in which people get rid of all their possessions and are left with nothing but their own self and the confrontation with their addiction? How do people open up when they have someone in front of them who has been through the same thing as them? What effect does the complete isolation from the outside world in the first few months of the stay and the exclusive exchange with other addicts have? I explore these questions with my pictures and draw an intimate portrait of a community that loses and gains new members every day and is thus in a constant state of flux.
All of the residents of the "Fleckenbühl" farm near Marburg live drug-free in a community. Their tough approach of subjecting residents to cold turkey and the lack of medical staff on the farm itself are stark differences to traditional addiction support services. The fact that newly admitted residents have a de facto 6-day working week from their second day on the farm is also part of the strict concept of the facility.
In my photographs, I negotiate not only the emotional worlds of the people rehabilitating themselves, but also my own perspective as a recovering addict. This position gives me a special status; I am no longer just the photographer looking at the community from the outside, but a part of it.
