Olaf Tamm, born 1962 in Münster, lives and works as a freelance photographer in Hamburg. After his photography apprenticeship in Berlin he was assistant to Christian von Alvensleben and in 1992 recipient of the first Reinhart-Wolf Prize for young German photography. Today, his commercial work focuses on visualisations of editorials and the realisation of visual concepts in reportages, documentaries and portraits. His images are published in MARE, STERN, Spiegel, ARTmagazin, BRANDeins, GEOSaison, GEOlino and Manager Magazin, among others.
2002 he founded the publishing house "SAM & friends" that enables the realisation and publication of his personal, international projects. After "Lake Tahoe - Visuals of Wood", follow the 4 volumes of the limited "RIVA Book Edition", his comprehensive work on the RIVA wooden boat classics designed by Carlo Riva. His latest book is "Wall of Death - the Theatre of Motorcycling", a documentary about motorcycle acrobatics that has been presented for over 100 years up to the present day. His personal work is also on display in exhibitions worldwide.In his current projects, he focuses on transience and the changes in our living and environmental conditions caused by man, in the photographic context.
While researching Bangalore, he came across the study of the Indian Academy of Sciences, which predicts the uninhabitability of Bangalore from 2025. It would probably be the first city of 10 million inhabitants worldwide to be declared uninhabitable. In addition to unrestricted urbanisation, increasing sealing of undeveloped areas and general air pollution, the use of water as a resource will become one of the main reasons for Bangalore's uninhabitability. Water is generally regarded as the precondition for life. The right to access to clean water was recognised as a human right by the UN General Assembly in 2010. It is a requirement for the human right to life, adequate nutrition and medical care.
During his bangaloREsidency@BORDA, he will focus on the cycle of water and photographically document the fine line between aesthetics and the horror of wasting and destroying our water resources.
