In its final weeks at the Museo delle Culture in Lugano, Switzerland is an entrancing exhibition dedicated to the Swiss photographer Peter W. Häberlin (1912 - 1953) and is the seventh project of the “Esovisioni” exhibition cycle. This cycle is a long-term project of the Museo delle Culture with the objective to define a sort of “map” describing how the West has viewed (and judged) the Other.
During their research, the museum staff unearthed the traces of Häberlin’s life through the diaries and accounts of his friends, travelling companions and remaining relatives. After two years of intense collaboration with the Swiss Foundation of Photography in Winterthur, the exhibition presents a rich selection of first prints, which were developed from the negatives conserved at the aforementioned Foundation.
Häberlin made his trans-Saharan reportage between 1949 and 1952: a vast series of photographs from four journeys, through which he followed the ancient caravan routes from Algiers, crossing the Saharan desert until he reached the North of Cameroon. Shortly after returning from his last trip, Häberlin died in a tragic accident in 1953, in the midst of his preparations for a new voyage to Mexico.
Information and images courtesy of the Museo delle Culture, Lugano
