Jacob Holdt  

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Jacob Holdt (born 1947 in Copenhagen, Denmark) is a Danish photographer, writer and lecturer, best-known for American Pictures.

Since 1991, Holdt has worked as a volunteer for CARE in several third-world countries. He has continued to document the lives of those in poverty while working for CARE.

His most recent projects have also focused on white supremacist hate groups. Holdt spent time living with leaders of the Ku Klux Klan and photographing their daily lives. Holdt is sympathetic with the people he encountered in these groups, pointing out that most grew up under marginal circumstances and often were victims of child abuse. Holdt emphasizes the similarities in background between white supremacists and poor minorities.

Holdt's ability to capture representations of the "filthy rich" and poverty in America resulted in him being nominated as one of the four shortlisted photographers for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize 2008. At the exhibition at The Photographer's Gallery in London Holdt presented his photographs for the prize in an effective and mesmerizing slideshow - each image beamed onto a plain white wall in a darkened room, immersing the audience in the dark and dreary world of poverty and maximizing the impact.

Holdt lost out on the prize to the photographer Esko Männikkö from Finland.

From 02.10.2009 until 07.02.2010 Holdt's pictures were exhibited in Louisiana Museum of Modern Art.



Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Jacob Holdt" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.

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