I clearly remember the day this picture was taken. It was 26 December 2004. I was driving to Bavaria to take photographs after spending Christmas with my then girlfriend and my mother, and it was snowing. I spotted these people standing on the hill and thought it might be interesting. I set up my large format camera, stood in the same spot for about two hours and took four frames – large format film is expensive and sometimes you need to wait a long time until it is perfect. Although, what is perfect is very subjective of course. For me, it is when an image has a feeling of possibility. Another frame of the four became the cover of my book Heimat. About 13 years ago, I also made an edition of this shot, which has the same kind of feeling. So this one is in fact my second best shot.
The emotion I have when I look at an image is totally different from the emotions when I shoot. I was standing there waiting for the scene, freezing, worried I might have snowflakes on the lens. I was wearing gloves which make it difficult to operate the camera. Shooting is a totally concentrated process, like meditation – you can’t think of anything else. It’s like when you play table tennis: you are not thinking about winning or what it feels like to win, it’s only the next ball that’s important.
