Present

Stephan Vanfleteren (1969) is best known for his probing black and white portraits, but in recent decades he has also produced a wide range of documentary, artistic and personal work. From street photography in global cities like New York to the genocide in Rwanda, from building fronts and shop windows to the mystical landscapes of the Atlantic Wall, from still lifes to penetrating portraits.

To mark Vanfleteren’s 50th birthday, he is celebrating with a major retrospective which will occupy the entire Antwerp Museum of Photography (FOMU, 25 October 2019 – 1 March 2020) and with this publication Present, in which he looks back over his fascinating career. “I was there, I was present”, says the photographer, who always feels himself to be both accomplice and witness.

For Present, Vanfleteren has taken a generous selection of more than 400 photos from his ample archive, some of which have become iconic images while others have never been published before. In extensive texts, he reflects on how his own work and photography as a genre have evolved over the past decades and links these developments with a number of major social changes.

This superbly illustrated book is an impressive overview of Vanfleteren’s work and offers a comprehensive picture of him as a photographer, as an artist and, above all, as a human being living life with empathy, wonder and curiosity.

Previous successful publications by Vanfleteren, such as Belgicum, Portret, Atlantic Wall and Façades & Vitrines, have become true collector’s items.