At the beginning of the 1950s the city of Giessen built emergency accommodation in an area
known as Auf dem Eulenkopf for people without fixed abode. Socially underprivileged families
were thus separated from the city's middle-class society. Living conditions were accordingly
difficult and social problems and violence soon followed. In the 1970s students began to
address the problems and tried to create a decent neighborhood together with the residents.
They found a prominent advocate in Horst-Eberhard Richter the director of the local
psychosomatic clinic. In 2020 fifty years after the foundation of the initiative Richter's
granddaughter Merle Forchmann embarked on a photographic exploration of today's Eulenkopf
housing estate. Over a period of two years Forchmann repeatedly traveled to Giessen. She
established contact with the social workers got to know the residents talked to the people
and started to photograph everyday life in the estate from within. With authentic powerful
images and intense recordings of conversations she has created an impressive portrait of the
neighborhood and its residents.
