Back to life!

Everyone hopes to live. Yet, those who experience clinical depression find it difficult to feel alive. All seems dark and grey. Sufferers speak of gloomy colours, a heaviness, a burden and emptiness, and being left without hope or confidence.

Nora Klein has managed to skilfully capture the suffering of depression. Her pictures are telling a story of deep sadness and loneliness, making a life of depression appear unliveable.

The directorate of the Deutsche DepressionsLiga e. V., in collaboration with BARMER and the Town & Country Stiftung are grateful to have helped make this illustrated work by Nora Klein possible.

The Deutsche DepressionsLiga e. V. was founded in 2009 acting as the first, and to date sole countrywide patient representation for people with clinical depression and their friends and families. We work in an honorary capacity to help educate and destigmatise the widespread illness depression.
We offer help for those affected as well as their families and friends, and represent their interests in front of politicians, the health care sector and the public. We remain entirely independent from the pharmaceutical industry or other economical groups of interest.

Find out more about us and our projects and activities on our website: www.depressionsliga.de

Waltraud Rinke, Member of the Board, Deutsche DepressionsLiga e. V.

Health expanded

According to the Robert Koch Institute, 10% of women and 6% of men report to have been diagnosed as depressed by a doctor or psychotherapist in the last 12 months. These are significant figures. But what do they mean for the everyday lives of these people? What are their families saying? Where can they find suitable support during a crisis or join self-help groups?

The latest book by photographer Nora Klein seeks to provide an answer to these questions. Her images portray complex impressions from the world of depressives. The emotions she captured strike a cord, awakening us to an illness which paralyses an everyday life and burdens relatives. Depression can be mild or severe. Sometimes it requires medical, medicinal or psychotherapeutical support. And other times the illness calls for an emergency treatment.

Self-help groups do offer an opportunity to reach out and find help. Here, like-minded and affected individuals share their experiences and try to reassure each other. Participants inform and advise each other, based on their own wealth of experiences. Patients help patients, relatives help relatives and vice versa. These are low-threshold experts in their field and they can offer help in supporting self-management of the disease.

The photo book »Some good, more bad« has been enabled with the self-help sponsorship from BARMER according to § 20 h SGB V.

Jens Krug, Self-help Agent

»Mal gut, mehr schlecht.« (»Some good, more bad«)

It’s an idiosyncratic title, which seeks no classification at first. Nora Klein has found a way to sensitively approach the issue of how society deals with depression.

Among the variety of ways to design and portray the topic, Nora Klein chose a subtle path, which showcases the illness from the viewpoint of the individual affected. In predominantly calm photography, she approaches a topic that is difficult to put in words.

An artful illustrative book project is a unique way to shine light on depression, compared to the more economical verbalisations of the disease and connected social problems. The project is a trace of the past, but also signals what needs to happen in the future. It’s a commitment to art and a chance for human action and growth.

The examination of the photography and accompanying texts is both a process as well as an event. It brings to life the issue of depression for those affected as well as those not affected, by incorporating the human crisis into an artistic process.

Town & Country Stiftung’s support of the book project by Nora Klein seeks to shed light on the illness and hopes to find sympathy for sufferers in our society.

Christian Treumann, Member of the Board, Town & Country Stiftung