Photography Exhibition
in Public Space

08.03. – 19.04.2025
Photographic Portrait Series from the Twin Cities of
Hanover, Poznán, and Hiroshima

Fotografische Ausstellung
im öffentlichen raum

08.03. – 19.04.2025
Fotografische Portraitserie aus den Partnerstädten
Hannover, Poznań und Hiroshima

Portrait Locations within Kulturdreieck

about the project

b o s s – this means women, their workplaces, insights into their everyday life. b o s s | working women are encounters with women, who despite their differences in age and background – be it social, ethnic, economic, or cultural – have one thing in common: They are bosses.

This series is based on the work and initiative of Hanover-based photographer Katrin Ribbe, who in 2014 began portraying and interviewing self-employed women bosses. Ten years later, and after many national exhibitions, the idea was born to open up the original project on an international scale.
Since one of the goals of town twinning is to promote cultural exchange between countries, the notion to collaborate on b o s s with female photographers from Hanover’s partner cities was an obvious one. Katrin Ribbe decided on the twin cities in Poland and Japan. Hence, the project itself creates a Kulturdreieck – a triangle of culture – with Hanover, Poznán and Hiroshima as its corner points.

A call for proposals was launched, followed by a selection process, and Katrin Ribbe found her colleagues in Kamila Kobierzyńska from Poznán and Aya Fujioka from Hiroshima. Each of the three photographers portrayed between six and eight women, of which they interviewed two, respectively. The portrayed women are all self-employed or owners of commercial businesses. All of them are shown in the setting of their workspaces, and in all their diversity.
In total, the series consists of 20 portraits and six interviews from Germany, Poland, and Japan.

The large-scale portraits are displayed as an open-air exhibition in the heart of the Kulturdreieck, located between Schauspiel Hannover (Theatre Hanover), Künstlerhaus, and Staatsoper (State Opera House). There, they connect artistic styles and promote the cultural exchange encouraged by international town twinning.

Project sponsor is Agentur für kreative Zwischenraumnutzung e. V., a non-profit association from Hanover that participates in urban development by enabling artists and cultural associations to use vacant spaces for creative endeavours.

For b o s s | working women, Katrin Ribbe portrayed and interviewed women bosses of all ages and from different sociocultural backgrounds in Hanover. “I initially had the idea for a photographic series on self-employed women after I had given birth to my first daughter. The work and the responsibilities that the portrayed women take on, and perhaps more importantly: the women themselves – however different their lives may be – are meant to take centre stage.”

Portrait Series Hanover

For b o s s | working women Kamila Kobierzyńska portrayed and interviewed female fine artists of all ages and sociocultural backgrounds in Poznán. “The studio is an artist’s home away from home. It’s in these spaces, which are so meaningful for the heroines of my projects, that I wanted to bring a series of intimate portraits to life.”

Portrait Series Poznań

For b o s s | working women, Aya Fujioka portrayed women from Hiroshima who have worked as self-employed bosses for more than 10 years.
“In Japan, there are very few women in positions of leadership. Only 12 %, according to some statistics. Among other factors, this can be attributed to the difficulty of coordinating a job, housework, and childcare.”

Portrait Series Hiroshima

PROJEct origin

This photographic portrait and interview series has been continuously realised since 2013, initially entitled b o s s | working women. Since then, artist and photographer Katrin Ribbe portrayed and interviewed more than 40 women bosses across Germany and abroad. Self-employed women’s reality of life, often pushed to the fringes of public discourse, now takes centre stage.

The series has been shown in numerous institutions and within a variety of contexts. In 2016, for the first time, the series was shown as a solo exhibition at Galerie für Fotografie e. V. in Hanover, Germany, in cooperation with the foundation Leben & Umwelt / Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Niedersachsen. In the same year, it was nominated for the Kulturförderpreis (promotion of culture award), awarded by Evangelische Landeskirche Niedersachsen. 2017 saw another solo exhibition at Forum Gestaltung e. V. in Magdeburg, Germany, sponsored by the Office for Gender Equality of Saxony-Anhalt’s state capital, Magdeburg. For the exhibition in Magdeburg, Katrin Ribbe portrayed six women from the city, and interviewed them about their realities of life as women bosses, about their life journeys, and about possible gender-based disadvantages they experience(d).

In 2019, the series was invited for the autumn exhibition Identitäten (Identities) of Salon Salder / Neue Kunst aus Niedersachsen, held at the Städtische Museen Salzgitter (Municipal Museums of Salzgitter), with 3 portraits being acquired for the museum’s collection.

In 2020, Katrin Ribbe was invited by Kaunas Photography Gallery as artist-in-residence, with the objective of portraying and interviewing women bosses from Lithuania. It was in Kaunas that the idea took hold to open the project on an international scale, and to include perspectives from artists around the world, who would portray and interview women bosses in their respective communities.

Likewise in 2020, b o s s was invited to FAVORITEN Festival in Dortmund, Germany, as part of the group exhibition Arbeit am Apparat (Work on the Apparatus), sponsored by the city’s office for culture. In 2022, it was shown at the queer-feminist multimedial arts festival BritneyX in Cologne, Germany. Dortmund and Cologne, respectively, saw the first open-air installation of the portraits.

As a continuation of these first open-air exhibitions, and in collaboration with the distinct artistic styles of Kamila Kobierzyńska from Poznán, Poland and Aya Fujioka from Hiroshima, Japan, b o s s | working women will now be shown at Kulturdreieck Hannover, expanded to include international artistic perspectives, and exhibited in the public space.

(Translation: Swantje Möller)