Juergen Teller: Jurgaiciai

We made a trip to the Hill of Crosses, and I couldn’t stop photographing it! - Juergen Teller

The infamous Hill of Crosses is a pilgrimage and tourist site near Siauliai, Lithuania, which originated after the November Uprising of 1830–31, an extensive yet unsuccessful attempt to overthrow Russian rule. Crosses is Juergen Teller’s intimate response to this place of remembrance, which he visited with his Lithuanian wife Dovile Drizyte and her parents in autumn 2022. With his ever curious, surveying eye, Teller captures the intense spirituality of this sacred destination. Responding to over 100,000 crucifixes within just one acre, his images embody this tangled web of religious iconography, including a dense multitude of crosses, stone sculptures of Jesus Christ draped in rosary beads, and large wooden carvings. Teller singles out details of small effigies of Christ and other emblematic features, deftly framing them against the landscape in an act of candid self-reflection. The series takes on an even deeper personal significance in the context of the 2022 passing of fashion designer Vivienne Westwood, with whom Teller had collaborated since 2007, and his gallerist since 2013 Suzanne Tarasieve. He embeds portraits of these powerful yet vulnerable women into his collection of symbolic images, a compelling tribute to two personalities who continue to inspire his work.