Land of Milk and Honey Photographs

The title can only be meant ironically as photographer Paul Kranzler tells the story of his elderly neighbors, Toni and Aloisia, living out their days in their one-room subsidized apartment. The deeply empathetic photos document the subjects' bewilderment at slipping out of the middle class due to forces beyond their control. "The main challenge of Kranzler's photographs is [his] determination to keep nothing at arm's length," writes an admiring critic of the young Linz-based artist, who tries to make himself a participant rather than clinical observer of the lives he shoots. Kranzler is a true 21st-century heir to the great Social Realist photographers of the past.