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"What does the ideal capital look like? Photographer Nick Hannes traveled to six countries - Egypt, Korea, Nigeria, Kazakhstan, Indonesia and Brazil - that have recently built a new capital or are in the process of doing so. Each and every one of them is a typical example of what Rem Koolhaas calls the Generic City: a planned city without historical layers, local identity or its own character. As a visual sociologist with a sharp eye for detail, Hannes searches for the human dimension in a setting full of spectacular architecture and pompous prestige projects. 'New Capital' is a critical reflection on unbridled neoliberal urban development and its social and ecological consequences, but is also peppered with subtle humor and surprising coincidences. Meandering between pride and sadness, 'New Capital' shows how utopia and dystopia are sometimes surprisingly close."--Publisher information.
About the author
Nick Hannes is a photojournalist and documentary photographer from Belgium, specialized in globalization, urbanization and migration. He is represented by the Panos Pictures agency in London. Hannes won the Magnum Photography Award – Documentary – for the series
Dubai. Bread and circuses and this year also the World Press Photo Award in the Series Africa category. At Lannoo he published the book
Red Journey in 2009.
Dorina Pojani is Associate Professor in Urban Planning at the University of Queensland. She is the author of
Trophy Cities: A Feminist Perspective on New Capitals (Edward Elgar, 2021).
