Looming over
View over the courtyard from the closed emergency psychiatric ward of Zurich University Hospital, Switzerland, through a window, at dusk. It is here seen across a closed window with a reflection in the background of the scene taking place in the room: a patient with severe depression sitting on a couch. Zurich, Switzerland, 14 August 2018...During the course of a year-long project about bipolar disorder, I was once embedded in the team of the emergency ward of a very large psychiatry hospital. Many patients in that ward spend their days going from their room to the coffee machine, to television room to smoking room and back. Pace of life is slow, and the changing daylight changes the mood of the ward, almost like a metaphor...Taken as I was embedded in the unit. Photographer did not influence the scene in any way (window was closed, patient lost in his thoughts and paying no attention to photographer), nor gave directions to anyone (the patient was sitting by himself and I did not talk to him).