01 - Street Photography Insights: An Interview with Thomas Hackenberg

A conversation about photographic consistency, absurd moments, and the power of long-term observation.

In this blog, I also want to give space to people whose work has left a strong impression on me – individuals whose perspective on street photography, whose images and personal paths are truly inspiring. Under the Interviews section, I’ll be introducing photographers I believe will offer real value to you as readers.

I’m starting with Thomas Hackenberg – a photographer who caught my attention very early on in my own journey with the genre. His image of the car in the river and the paddleboarders stuck with me from the first moment I saw it: strange and full of unanswered questions. Rightly so, it was successful in various contests. It’s one of those rare photographs that stands out in the overwhelming flood of street images.

When you dive deeper into Thomas’ work, you quickly notice the consistency and high quality of his output. His street photography reflects years of experience, a sharp eye for the unusual in the everyday, and a refined sensitivity for the decisive moment. Unlike many current street photographers, Thomas has been walking the streets with a keen eye for many many years – and it shows. His images are marked by emotion, absurdity, and carefully constructed compositions. A visual language that resonates deeply with my own understanding of street photography.

You can find his website and more of his work at the following links:

Website: https://hackenberg.info/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thomas_hackenberg_photo/

All photographs in this post are © Thomas Hackenberg. Used with permission.

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What is it about street photography that continues to fascinate you – aesthetically, socially, or emotionally?

What fascinates me most is creating something out of nothing, so to say, seeing the unusual in the ordinary and, ideally, turning it into a photograph that might work – giving an everyday moment a great stage for itself. For me, a good street photo must be made candidly, captivate me at first glance and make me want to take that second look, like wanting to read a poem twice. I like photos that raise more questions than provide answers. I also like photos that tell a story in a single image, and I particularly adore humorous and quirky pictures and visual puns in everyday life. I often carry Elliott Erwitt’s work in the back of my head. When I am out on the streets, I like chasing for any interesting scene that hits my eye, observed scenes from the great theater of street life that might only exist for a split second and then they’re gone forever. Freezing these moments in a fraction of a second, thus documenting them and making them unforgettable, that’s what I love! I love these special moments, so rare and so elusive, when all things fall into place and a good picture emerges. It’s the joy and anticipation of making a good street picture that drives me. After all, it’s all about curiosity. It’s all about finding out what life has in store for me on any given day – I’m eager to see what’s around the next corner.

I come from the reportage and documentary department. My passion for photographing street scenes was first sparked as a teenager in the late 1970s, when I first saw the pictures of German photojournalist Thomas Hoepker published in German GEO magazine. His street photos of Beijing, Italy, the US, and most of all his behind-the-scene looks into the then still existing German Democratic Republic made a lasting impression on me. I wanted to try that too, dare to photograph strangers! Later came influences by such masters as Joel Meyerowitz, Martin Parr, and Matt Stuart. The two grannies in this set date from this early period of my photography (1991) – the tag of “street photography” had not yet been invented… I wanted to show life on the streets, the conditio humana so to speak – pure, candid, and unstaged!

How would you describe your photographic style? Has it changed over time and who or what influenced those changes?

I would describe my photographic style as candid, respectful, and super-quick. After a phase of warming up and making some usually bad shoots for getting into the mood, I have become more courageous compared to the earlier days. I dare to go closer these days, often finding out that the people in my frame don’t even notice they’re photographed or not care at all. In the very early days, I shot analog with a mirror reflex camera and zoom lens, these days I rely on a mirrorless full-format sensor camera and a 35 mm prime lens alone, so that has changed as well. Gear must be light, more important are comfortable shoes!

What exactly catches your eye in the chaos of our world? Can you describe what triggers your instinct to raise the camera?

Tough question. It’s in the subconscious part of my head, I guess. The main driving force for making the pictures I like comes from collecting and studying photo books, another passion I follow. Only by studying the photos of other great photographers can you find your own visual voice and language I’d say. Seeing what touches you and what you don’t like so much. I can’t count the number of books and pictures I have looked at… So that’s the greatest asset I guess. What is more, I’m definitely the color guy, driven by strong colors and great light. Then it’s human gestures, a moving hand, a kiss, someone yawning, things like this. But speaking of light, one thing that is important to me is that the subject always comes first, and especially with the modern digital cameras there is no such thing as “bad light”. I’ll shoot a great subject in any light, no matter if the weather and lighting are less than perfect.

Chasing the one decisive moment that says it all – and opening your ears can definitely help, too – like the proposal of marriage at Trevi fountain in Rome shown in this set. I was already on the go, heard a scream behind me, turned around, saw the man kneeing down, lifted my camera and fired a few shots from above my head. Only one was in focus, with the prospective bride’s hands right in front of her face in that truly emotional moment, the man kneeing down and presenting the ring. I love the fact that all these faces are on the couple, all applauding, only so few smartphones lifted. Look at all these happy and smiling faces!

Another thing I learnt from a presentation by Matt Stuart in Luxemburg: What happens once often also happens a second time, stay on it! I first missed the yawning man in the shot from Dublin in this set. Saw it, lifted my camera… …and gone it was, no yawning, too late, just a sitting man in the light, boring. But then I stayed on that scene, waited for the next yawn – and here it was! In the meantime, a taxi had entered the scene and parked in my foreground, offering some great reflections of the building behind – sheer serendipity which comes to those who never give up and keep on waiting and walking.

Has your approach shooting in the streets changed over the years – for example, in how you observe or anticipate moments?

This is in part already answered in the questions above. The key thing is to remain curious, being open to life, open to change. Whereas I was keen on juxtapositions and great details ten years ago, I still like them today, especially when humor plays a role, but filling the frame with a multilayered scene resonates much more with me these days, And it’s quite a challenging task, so my failure rate is enormous! But I keep on trying. Observing and anticipating moments also comes from experience and from being open to life and reading human body language. Plus caring about your own body language: being open-minded and showing a positive attitude definitely helps to make people in your scene feel comfortable and easy, provided they have observed you at all. I have my tricks for trying to remain invisible though.

I have been shooting street for some 40 years now, including some major breaks caused by a long focus on my professional career and family affairs, where time was so rare and my photographic topics were mainly dedicated to photographing my kids. But all these years nevertheless train your eyes, train you to really “see”, and that gives you a lot of experience. Plus I don’t want to repeat myself and shoot the same things and motifs over and over again that I shot ten years ago, so I have become more selective I’d say in what are the real keepers these days.

Are you currently exploring any long-term photographic themes, and how do you develop such bodies of work?

I have been working on editing and sequencing my first monograph over the last two or three years. I am working on a book, and I would be the happiest guy ever if this project would actually materialize one day! Seeing your work printed is a different thing compared to your website or Instagram, plus I love the haptics and the smell of paper! The outcome already looks good to me and I’m happy with a great part of it, though still not completely. So I will keep on working on it for a while until my gut tells me “it’s ready”. The book will not have a fix topic or theme, it collects my years of being out on the streets. With these single pictures, I am trying to tell a story about us humans, ordinary scenes from ordinary life.

In the past I have worked on different projects, portraying a blind girl in an effort to raise money for offering her piano classes through an article in our local newspaper, documenting my town’s relationship with local football club Eintracht Braunschweig (for an English magazine), or documenting protests in our city for the local newspaper. More on this can be found in the Portfolio/Projects section of my website.

Do you prefer shooting in your own city or when traveling? And how does familiarity with a place affect your street photography – does local knowledge help or hinder your creativity?

Both at equal measures I’d say. During a portfolio review at a festival, Matt Stuart once told me that the best pictures you’d get in your home turf. Knowing the light at different times of the year, season, day. Knowing best where those spots are that are most busy at certain times. Definitely true! But then again I love really busy scenes with many people, and when you live in a smaller town, chances are limited for crowded, multilayered pictures. Or you may start to repeat yourself.

On the other hand, in 2024, UK publisher and photographer David Solomons invited me to do a zine on my hometown of Braunschweig for his Bump Books series – so good things can also happen in smaller and not so spectacular places like my town with a population of around 250,000. For his Bump Book series, David has a policy of only doing city-based zines if the photographer is based there and has been shooting it over a long period of time. I see what he means! So local knowledge definitely helps: an example could be the picture with the square reflections and the cloud in the rear window of the parked car in this set. I had observed and followed these reflections for a long time (which only occurred at certain times of the year and day) and waited for the right foreground. This picture is also included in the Braunschweig zine.

One the other hand, like all of us, I also do enjoy exploring new cities with my camera, maybe even cities with more reliable good light compared to Northern Germany where I live. This year I really enjoyed Dublin (five days of sunshine, I was so lucky!), last year I was in Rome, and I will go to Istanbul later in the fall. But I also love shooting in Berlin, which is only 90 train minutes away from me. Any vibrant city with really busy streets and corners – these are my dream places!

In a time where images are shared constantly – what does publishing your own work mean to you? Do you see social media as a meaningful platform, or more as a necessary compromise?

With all of the drawbacks and algorithm-related downsides of Instagram we are all aware of, I must say that I love the platform! And not so much for seeing it as a valuable publishing platform for my pictures, but rather as a hub for seeing the world through other photographers’ lenses and connecting with other people, some of them having become my real-life friends in the meantime. This would all not have become possible without Instagram. The pictures are one thing, but the friendships and the exchange between similar-minded photographers are the other! Plus, from the traffic a picture creates, the number and content of comments from people I trust they are honest, I can get a notion if a picture might work in radiating my intended message or not. And without Instagram, I wouldn’t have learned about all the festivals, shows, and competitions in the street photography domain I love to follow myself. So yes – Instagram (the only social medium I use in this respect) is a platform I like as it connects me with my people.

How do you deal with editing and self-critique? Do you find it difficult to select your best work or sometimes doubt your own photographic judgment?

Over the years I have become more stringent and stricter with myself I hope, which also comes with shooting a lot, looking at a lot of other great photographers’ works, and gaining more proficiency and experience in what you do. Today I am more after complex, nicely layered scenes which offer something to explore and read in the picture. Normally, when I have uploaded my pictures in my Lightroom, I see the keepers and reasonable ones immediately. And allowing time to pass and getting more of an emotional distance to your own darlings also helps in distilling the best ones.

Like all of us, I sometimes find it hard to figure out the best shot in a series of different pictures I made of the same scene. I look for no overlaps, little quirky details, things like that. Doubts never stop, you may also know that. There is so much great work out in this world, and that’s a good thing! I have my own compass, preferring meaning and quirkiness in pictures that try to tell a story about the human condition.

But as I said before, great pictures are only one side of the medal, great connections and contacts to other people and photographers are just as important to me as the picture itself. And it’s also the process of making the picture that gives me the greatest joy, the anticipation of possibly getting a good snap that might work. It’s the process leading up to a good picture, going out and seeing the world: see what I mean?

When you're going through creative lows or moments of doubt – what helps you move forward?

Listening to great music, my other passion. Giving it a mental break, letting some time pass by and then starting with a fresh mind after weeks or even months. I encountered so much stress and pressure in my professional life, I definitely don’t want to put any pressure on me whatsoever as far as my much-loved street photography is concerned.

And looking at other photographers’ and artists’ great works, as I said before, always helps to free up your mind – by getting my hands on some great photo books or zines.

What’s something about street photography that outsiders often misunderstand – and what would you like them to know?

“When you carry a camera, you have a license to see.” (Joel Meyerowitz).

Discovering and embracing the world and seeing little things so easily overlooked gives me the greatest joy. It’s these rare moments of standing in the middle of a sidewalk in a flow of bystanders walking up to you or hanging around on a sunny corner waiting for something to happen – my greatest passion! You wouldn’t believe what life can have in store for your camera until you experienced these little unbelievable moments that actually happened! Moments and situations in front of your camera that you couldn't think of in any script in the world beforehand and which afterwards awaken my most beautiful feelings of happiness!

Else, I love floating around with my camera in hand like an aimless flaneur: going right? Going left? It doesn’t matter – just keep your mind and eyes open.

Click!