Claus Rohland — It is the traveller only who is foreign

Juhan Kuus Documentary Photo Centre presents “It is the traveller only who is foreign”, an exhibition by acclaimed Danish artist Claus Rohland, centred on colour photographs taken in Egypt, Turkey, Iraq and Syria in the 1970s. Over the decades, humidity damage on the diapositives has transformed these images into poetic, almost mirage-like images of memory.

The title of the exhibition is based on Robert Louis Stevenson’s thought: “There are no foreign lands. It is the traveller only who is foreign.” In Rohland’s works, the question of foreignness shifts from the subject depicted to the viewer: the foreigner may not be another person or an unknown place, but the one who looks — with their own gaze, knowledge, prejudices and limits.

Rohland’s travel photographs stem from documentary and travel photography traditions, but their later fate has made them more layered. The colour positives, damaged by time and storage conditions, are not simply faded images. Their transformation opens a new layer of meaning: something dissolves, becoming unreadable, while a new space for interpretation emerges.

“Rohland’s works contain something that recalls the philosophy of kintsugi: a crack or damage does not signify only loss, but, precisely by being brought to the surface, may reveal a work’s new value and meaning. Damage becomes the condition of transformation. This concerns not only creative practice, but life more broadly — the ability to reframe failures, loss and ruptures, and to see in them the beginning of something new. There is a certain inner resilience in this,” says Kristel Aimee Laur, curator and exhibition designer at Juhan Kuus Documentary Photo Centre.

Due to humidity damage, many of the people and places depicted in the photographs can no longer be precisely identified. This loss of documentary precision gives the exhibition an unexpectedly human dimension. The emphasis shifts from recognisable fixation to meaning, bringing to the fore shared human experience and the possibility of empathy.

Claus Rohland is an acclaimed Danish artist whose multifaceted practice spans painting, photo-based works, and experimental art culture. His works are held in several important public collections, including the Danish Design Museum, the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris and the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris. Rohland has received several grants and awards from the Danish Arts Foundation, as well as the van Gogh Prize, the August Schiøtt Award and the Europe Prize in Ostend.

“It is the traveller only who is foreign” is part of the Documentary Photo Centre’s focus programme dedicated to humanist photography.

Supported by: Kultuurkapital, City of Tallinn, Telliskivi Creative City, Ibis Styles, Taevas Ogilvy, HRX, Ajar Stuudiod, Tikkurila, Pakendi, Artproof.