The Stahnsdorf South-Western cemetery on the outskirts of Berlin is the tenth-largest in the
world. Large areas of the site are forested with more wild flora and winding paths than
perfectly trimmed hedges and asphalt roads. Over the period of two years photographer Anke
Krey driven to find out more about their work shadowed the employees at the graveyard with
her camera. How does the daily confrontation with death affect them? What is their relationship
to the earth and the forest that provides the final resting place for thousands upon thousands
of people? ERDEN provides a respectful and quiet chronicle of the daily tasks and the complex
demands of the work here which can vary from one hour to the next. Prior to funerals for
example the workers swap their everyday work clothes for a black suit and tie the foresters
and technicians become funeral directors and spiritual counselors who bury the deceased and
offer words of solace to relatives. Anke Krey's photographs capture and condense the
transcendence of mundane manual work alongside these ever-present reminders of human mortality
with a rare intensity.
