How to cry

Scheduled for 2025: exhibition and book

Photographs (since 2017)

The grief weighed heavily. The sorrow was massive. I was going through a deep existential crisis and one night I came home terribly drunk from a grueling, senseless job. It was 2016 and I tried to find room within myself for that heavy burden. I wanted to cry. To bawl, to dislodge this heaviness off my soul.

Yet - it did not work. My tears were stuck.

In that situation, my subconscious decided to take a creative substitute action: »Who wants to be photographed by me while crying?«

I posted the question on Facebook. An artistic shoutout for help. The next morning I found almost 40 reactions to my request. 40 people offered to cry for me in front of the camera. I freaked out, thanked all of them courteously, and didn‘t contact them any further. The time hadn‘t come yet.

Some time after that my friend Timur nudged me to finally take the photographs with him. I took the plunge and embarked on it. From that moment on I continuously occupied myself with this topic, I started to take pictures of people while they were crying, I arranged appointments for photo sessions and year after year I advanced further.

I realized that my turmoil originated from all my bottled-up inner pressure and that my spontaneous request on Facebook had kicked off a healing process within myself. I recognized my own grief in the variety and abundance of other people‘s tears, mirroring my own, and step by step my fear of it dissolved.

I eagerly learned from my teachers, who decided on their own on the places and circumstances of their photos, and at some point in time (as one might expect) I myself was able to cry.

Would you like to learn more about the project? Then drop me a line at: mail@andreas-tobias.com

»You can learn how to cry. Lean your head against the window in the bus, follow the heartbeat, the trace of the raindrops. Let down your arms, open your hands and let the warmth from which you came reenter you. Forgive! Your heart will grow. Everything will become light for you.« Ilja Winter