A break from reality.
Christian Platz visited Legoland in Billund, Denmark, for his work “Is this Lego or is it real?”
View from the elevated train to the Duplo playground / Legoland, Billund (DK) Photo: Christian Platz
Lego bricks / Lego House Billund (Denmark) Photo: Christian Platz
Vintage car / Legoland Billund (Denmark) Photo: Christian Platz
Pyramid / Lego House Billund (Denmark) Photo: Christian Platz
Cobweb tree / Lego House Billund (Denmark) Photo: Christian Platz
Coincidences, accidents, incidents: Life surrounds us in all its ruthlessness. Our forests are plagued by pests, the dream of a single-family home is financially on the line, and the sword of Damocles of uncertainty hovers over the Sunday outing. Who can know what’s lurking around the next bend!? Every attempt to plan the future turns into a gamble.
Legoland offers a way out of the dilemma. Here, Lego trees grow without bark beetles, Lego houses stand without land prices, and Lego cars drive without flat tires. Accident-free, electric jeeps steer us through artificial savannahs. A few meters further on, we are immersed in realistic miniature landscapes. There, any sense of time and space fades away. More and more often I ask myself: Is this Lego or is it real?
Christian Platz, born 1988 in Siegen, NRW, works as a freelance photographer. Even during his master’s studies in human geography, he was interested in the manifold interrelationships between people and their environment, which, depending on space and place, produce very specific realities for individuals and societies.
