North Korea 2012-2016: Photographs I

(2012-2016)

Between 2012 and 2016, while conducting research for my book See You Again in Pyongyang, I made five trips to North Korea, each ranging in length from 3 to 30 days. I amassed an archive of several thousand photographs. Most of them have never been shown publicly. Viewing them today fills me with a sense of deep melancholia, for a place that haunted and fascinated me for so long, a place that I came to develop a certain fascination for, despite the hardships that its people have had to endure, a place that contains great beauty, often in spite of — or occasionally as a result of — the bizarre strictures that have been imposed upon it. Melancholia, because I suspect I will never be able to go back there. For me, all that’s left are these visual mementos that I return to from time to time. Over the next few days, I will post a selection of these photos for my subscribers.