Risk Hazekamp – Solitary Fruit – 2012
14 of a series of ± 20 analogue photographs made in The Deep South

At the end of 2011 Risk Hazekamp followed the route of the (white) American writer John Howard Griffin, who, in his book Black Like Me, reports of his travels as a supposedly 'black' man (with help of medicine, UV light and make-up) through the Deep South.

From the prologue of Black Like Me (1960):

"It is the story of the persecuted, the defrauded, the feared and detested. 

I could have been a member of any 'inferior' group. 

Only the details would have differed. 

The story would be the same."

In these sentences Hazekamp saw a clear invitation to other persons of 'inferior groups' to follow his example. She projected his subversive idea on the gender theme, and travelled not as a woman, but as a man. She travelled alone, which means that she was as well the photographer as the model.

This project is based on the question how one's identity is defined and how identity is constructed. Can you decide how to define yourself or does your (daily) environment draw the outline of your identity?

Risk Hazekamp is an independent visual artist based in Berlin and The Hague. Hazekamp works primarily with analogue photography to explore the (de)construction of identity and in particular, the way in which gender and identity intersect.

After studying at the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam and at the Jan van Eyck Academy in Maastricht, Hazekamp had solo exhibitions in different European galleries and showed work at international fairs of contemporary art such as ART COLOGNE, LISTE Basel, PHOTO MIAMI, ARCO Madrid or PARIS PHOTO. In 2010 Hazekamp decided to no longer participate in commercial art fairs.


Hazekamp's work is represented in important public collections like Maison Européenne de la Photographie de Paris, MACBA Museum Barcelona, Gemeente Museum The Hague or Arnhem Museum of Modern Art. Since 2010 Hazekamp teaches at different art academies. She was head tutor photography at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Maastricht from 2010 until 2014.