ABOUT THE SERIES

You Always Cry Twice When You Go to the South.This project is a tribute to the city of Bari and other places of South Italy, where I spent an intense and unforgettable time. It is a tribute to my friends, strangers who became my friends, and strangers who remained strangers, but let me have a glimpse of their life. This is also a tribute to people who made my coffee and gave me a cornetto every day, basketball guys who welcomed ‘the boy who came from Yugoslavia with a van’ with open hands, guys that stole my phone and camera at the beach at six in the morning, drivers who didn’t kill me, doctors who saved my eye, a medical system which doesn’t work, trains that come on time, trains that are late but anyway come at the right time, and fireworks during the day.“When a stranger comes to the South he always cries twice: when he arrives and when he leaves.”
- Nik Erik Neubauer

“The story is set in a large city that all, more or less, have seen, yet few know deeply.” These are the opening words of Napoli Milionaria (1950), a film by Eduardo De Filippo. “This city is not like all oth- er cities of the world,” the narrator continues, “it is not made only of streets and squares, but above all the alleys. Narrow, dark and foul-smelling, in which no one wants to enter and stay. All kinds of people live there, a humanity afflicted by the same problems, needs, and sufferings.” The film takes us into a randomly chosen street, because in Naples, “all are the same anyway.” We meet the tram driver Genaro, donna Amalia, a wife who cannot cook without complaining, Amadeo, who is always playing cards with his daydreaming friend Federico, and other protagonists.Naples, Bari and other cities of southern Italy immediately charm the incidental visitor. They appeal to us with their dazzling, although sometimes less sparkling, touristic attractions. But no matter how often we go back, they remain mysterious. They crawl under your skin, want you to feel them, under- stand them, yet for us passers-by, the narrow streets mostly remain speechless. There is nothing else left for us than to turn to travelogues philosophical texts, music, film, tv shows and of course, photographs.Nik Erik Neubauer’s photographs are evocative and convincing. Disarmingly honest. We believe his emotions (and even more so the emotions of his subjects): the excitement and apathy, wonder and boredom, joy and no less grief. Suddenly, we feel close to those parts of town we cannot communi- cate with, because we do not know how to open up to them and they aren’t talking to us either. Sud- denly, we understand why residents of Le Vele di Scampia district in Naples, cried when they tore down their apartment complex, even though their neighbourhood was a popular playground for drug dealers and the place where the Camorra fought bloody battles for decades. We are moved by the joy of amateur football players, even though we never had much appreciation for football. We envy the friendship in these places, which seems more sincere, more real.The narrator in Napoli Milionaria says: “This, perhaps, is not even a story, and even if it were, it would not be an original story. For a long time now there are no new stories, just old ones, because nothing new is happening to anyone, even though it looks new and different'. Napoli milionaria was made in 1950, whereas Nik's photographs were made three quarters of a century later and in very different circumstances. They tell no new stories, the narrator of the film might say, and yet we haven't heard them before.
- Meta Krese