Review by Lee Halvorsen •
Rotkäppchen Românesc is a spellbinding photographic railroad journey in today’s Romania. Horst Klein made these images over several years as he traveled by train in wintertime Romania to remote and sometimes semi-abandoned train stations and train landscapes. These are not typical train photos but rather brief glimpses through the train windows of an evolving Romania.
An important background for the premise of the Romanian Redhats…the Rotkäppchen Românesc is reprinted at the end of the book, an excerpt from Cǎile Ferate Romǎne (CFR, the Romanian Rail regulations). Article 153 of these regulations requires what they call “parading” at all train stations, no matter the demand, no matter the lack of a true requirement. “Parading” required a railroad employee to monitor the train by standing in a specific, marked location, and to wear a red cap; he/she had a green/red wand for daytime and a green/red flashlight for night. Train fans called these station monitors, “Little Red Riding Hoods.” They stood in their lonely spots with their red and green signals to monitor the trains and signal the train if some malfunction was detected. Always wearing a red hat, perfectly centered.
The 2005 Article 153 was implemented post-communism but may have been a leftover from the bureaucracy and authoritarianism of communist Romania. The run down, perhaps abandoned communities served by train station are significant composition elements of each image but the star, the hero of the image is the person in the red hat.
The compositions are very well done, especially considering the small window of time and space Klein had for each of them. I found many stories in the book, in each image, and in each red hat. The emotion and mood of each station wasn’t a klaxon-like in-your-face impact but rather a compelling, human-interest plea…I wanted to know what the Red Hat was thinking, feeling, seeing. Superb sequencing enhanced the images’ stories, creating an almost organic body of visual emotion…I could sense Romania, the people and the land; the Red Hats were symbols, icons of those who lived and had lived in the rail communities that were slowly transitioning from Communist rule to modernity.
The hard cover image has a Red Hat standing on his spot waving his green wand in front of a neat station. The back cover shows a Red Hat standing on the spot behind a large tree visible only from the waist down, but the green wand is visible. I assume it’s a Red Hat even though I can’t see above the Red Hat’s waist…the contrast between the neat, fully lit and visible Red Hat on the cover and the almost invisible Red Hat on the back cover hints at the transition the rail community is going through.
A man and a boy, perhaps his son, are shown standing on the station’s spot, both wearing red hats. The sense of family and tradition are strong despite the loneliness of the image as they watch the train pass, alone, in the dark. Many of the stations appear abandoned or severely neglected; nonetheless, a Red Hat is parading at each of them. Harsh weather, perfect train, no people, no problems…but still a Red Hat. Someday, perhaps soon, technology will replace the Red Hats and Klein’s book will take on an even more important historical role.
The book itself is well designed and comfortable to hold and read. Two types of paper are used; in the front the images are faithfully reproduced on Arctic Volume White paper changing to book-like Munken Pure paper at the end. This more traditional book paper contains the train regulations (in three languages) and an inciteful essay by Professor Rolf Sachesse who credits Klein with the eye of an illustrator providing a romantic look at life in Romania.
This truly is a captivating journey, and I highly recommend the images, the stories and this view into one little piece of life in Romania.
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Lee Halvorsen is assistant editor, writer and visual artist.
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Horst Klein – Rotkäppchen Românesc
Artist: Horst Klein, currently living in Krefeld, Germany
Contributor: Rolf Sachsse
Publisher: BUMMBUMM BOOKS, Cologne, Germany
Website: for BUMMBUMM BOOKS and this book.
Printing: Livonia Print, Riga, Latvia
Book design: Florian v Wissel
Language: German, English, Romanian
Hardback with blind embossing/debossing, 140 pages, stitched binding, 89 color images, 17.2 x 23 cm, ISBN 978-3-948059-12-5
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