Meeting with the photographer christopher herwig

We invite you to listen to the conversation with Christopher Herwig, the author of the photographs presented at the “Soviet Bus Stops” exhibition at the 15 ISFF ŻUBROFFKA!

International Short Film Festival ZUBROFFKA 2021
June 10, 2021, Camera Cafe, Białystok
Host: Piotr Doliński

Photographer Christopher Herwig first noticed the unusual architecture of Soviet-era bus stops during a 2002 long-distance bike ride from London to St. Petersburg. Challenging himself to take one good photograph every hour, Herwig began to notice surprisingly designed bus stops on otherwise deserted stretches of road. A dozen years later, Herwig had covered more than 30,000 miles in 15 countries of the former Soviet Union, traveling by car, bike, bus and taxi to hunt down and document these bus stops.

The local bus stop proved to be fertile ground for local artistic experimentation in the Soviet period, and was built seemingly without design restrictions or budgetary concerns. The result is an astonishing variety of styles and types across the region, from the strictest Brutalism to exuberant whimsy.

Christopher Herwig – He has been photographing for over 20 years. He is most interested in stories from the lives of common people. He has worked for UN peacekeeping missions in West Africa, the Middle East and around the world. The author has provided photos from some of the remotest regions of the world, from the Pamir mountains in Tajikistan to the rainforests of West Africa, for publications including GEO, CNN traveler, Geographical, Lonely Planet, DAMN magazine and many more. He has worked with non-government organizations and development agencies in some of the poorest parts of the world. He has worked commercially in London, Stockholm, Vancouver and New York. Currently he is based in Jordan working primarily with the Syrian Crisis.