Jessica Backhaus
one day in november
12 may - 17 june

Jessica Backhaus was born in Cuxhaven, Germany in 1970. At the age of sixteen, she moved to Paris where she studied photography and visual communications. Here she would meet Gisele Freund in 1992, who became her mentor and close friend.

In 1995 her passion for photography drew her to New York, where she started assisting photographers and pursued her own projects. Since then her work has been shown in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including The National Portrait Gallery in London and the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin. In Fall 2005 her first book, “Jesus and the Cherries” was published by Kehrer Verlag, Heidelberg. Fall 2008 brought two new books, both published by Kehrer Verlag. The first titled “What Still Remains” and the second book “One Day in November” which is a visual homage to Gisèle Freund, who would have celebrated her 100th birthday in December 2008.
While based in New York, Jessica divides her time and life between Europe and the United States.


One Day in November is Jessica Backhaus’ pictorial tribute to her friend and mentor, the photographer and historian Gisèle Freund. The two met in 1992, following a panel discussion that was part of the biennial, Le Mois de la Photographie, striking up a friendship that lasted until the older artist’s death in 2000. In her description of her relationship with Freund in her introduction to the book there is a depth of humility, a deference to the weight of tradition, the received wisdom of elders that can be rare in the world of contemporary photography. This is especially striking given that, as Backhaus reveals in the last paragraph of her essay, never during the course of her friendship with Gisèle did she offer her work up for comment or critique. Rather, they went for walks, shopped and cooked, visited restaurants and exhibitions.