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I believe that discipline is a core trait.

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And I think that it is a foundation.

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If you are going after a big goal,

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you first need passion for it,

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and she did have passion for politics,

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but on top of that you need discipline.

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You can't do things without discipline.

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I photographed Angela Merkel for the first time in 1991

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for this project 'Spuren der Macht' [Traces of Power]

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And the reason I chose her back then was

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that she was new to the high office as a minister.

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On the one hand, she was still very inexperienced,

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within the realm of politics,

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but, from the beginning, I sensed a certain strength in her

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and also a certain independence of mind.

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And despite of her inexperience

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she knew what she wanted

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and what she didn't want.

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And I thought, with this strength and independence,

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it is possible that she might succeed.

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It was clear to me,

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and I had told her that from the start,

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that I wanted to follow her for at least eight,

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or maybe even ten years.

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The fact, that she would become Chancellor,

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was unforeseeable.

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The concept was, that I wanted to see the physical,

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but also the psychological changes.

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That's why, during the first years,

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1991 to 1998,

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I interviewed her every year.

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What did she change?

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What changed her?

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And what did I learn?

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In a way, this is not a historical exhibition

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we should be clear about that,

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instead we are showing a work of art,

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a photographic one.

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It is the third collaboration

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of this institution with Frau Koelbl.

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For us at the DHM, of course, there is always the question

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of how close to the present we can get.

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Many people will probably look at these pictures

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in a completely different way

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than if we had opened the exhibition in December 2021.

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And that I find exciting,

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because it shows how we only ever see that,

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which is connected to our immediate present

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and these presents are constantly changing

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and only once we are ready

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to really look at the diversity of presents,

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we can arrive at a historical verdict.

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It really is German history,

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because with Angela Merkel we had

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a first woman Chancellor in Germany

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and politics had always been completely dominated by men

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So, for her to prevail in this arena,

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first as minister and then actually becoming Chancellor,

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that really was somehting great

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and something special, I might add.