Pier to Pier
‘Pier to Pier’ is about the 2,5 kilometers of beach and boulevard between the northern fishing pier and the pleasure pier of Scheveningen.
200 years ago, the first bathing houses were placed on the beach. They marked the start of the modern Scheveningen sea-bathing culture.
However, all those years ago, Scheveningen was mainly a poor fishing village.
My family is from Scheveningen and ‘Van der Zwan’ is a well-known local family name . Here, my grandfather had a fish shop and also my father grew up here. The stories I heard from them sketched a completely different picture of the beach and the sea, which was full of dangers. Also, the brother of my father drowned near the fishing Pier just after the war.
It was this contradiction that made me decide to delve deeper with my camera into the contemporary Scheveningen. I just kept coming back to the beach, the boulevard and the pier to visualize the modern bathing and beach culture which attracts so many visitors from all over the world.
200 years ago, the first bathing houses were placed on the beach. They marked the start of the modern Scheveningen sea-bathing culture.
However, all those years ago, Scheveningen was mainly a poor fishing village.
My family is from Scheveningen and ‘Van der Zwan’ is a well-known local family name . Here, my grandfather had a fish shop and also my father grew up here. The stories I heard from them sketched a completely different picture of the beach and the sea, which was full of dangers. Also, the brother of my father drowned near the fishing Pier just after the war.
It was this contradiction that made me decide to delve deeper with my camera into the contemporary Scheveningen. I just kept coming back to the beach, the boulevard and the pier to visualize the modern bathing and beach culture which attracts so many visitors from all over the world.