An exhibition of rare photos in Yangon provides a window into the country’s past and present, revealing how things have changed – and what has stayed the same – in the last 100 years.

Thanks to the Munich State Museum of Ethnology, photos taken over a century ago are now on display at the National Theatre in Yangon from November 22 to January 12.

Complementing photographer Christine Scherman’s 43 blackand- white photographs from 1911 are 43 colour photographs taken between 2010 and 2013 by Birgit Neiser. Both photographers are from Munich, and their joint show, entitled Golden Land: Burma/Myanmar, 100 Years, reveals striking similarities between Scherman’s monochrome photographs from the past and Neiser’s artwork from the present era.

The juxtaposition is all the more surprising given that Neiser had not seen Scherman’s work at the time she took her own photographs.

“At first I had no idea and I didn’t know anything about Christine Scherman and her photos. I was really overwhelmed when I saw her photos. What a coincidence – I have many matching images in my own archive.”

“She was a Munich documentary photographer from a hundred years ago and I am a Munich documentary photographer too,” Neiser said. “I was surprised that two female photographers from the same city documented the same country. A hundred years have passed, but it became a great project.” more…