Info

• 104 pages, 21 × 27 cm
  
• Languages: German, English
  
• ISBN 978-3-948174-13-2

Nominations / Awards
Silver – German Photobook Award 2023/24
Longlist Stiftung Buchkunst, The most beautiful German books 2022
Shortlist – Belfast Photo Festival 2022

Editorial / Edit
Gillian Henn

Design
Christine Lange

The birth of a child marks not only the beginning of a new life, but also the birth of a mother. A second beating heart finds its place within her body. But when this second heart suddenly beats outside the body, everything is turned upside down.
The photo book *A Second Beating Heart* tells the extraordinary story of a woman who, after giving birth to her child, never leaves her home. What begins gradually develops into her new reality. For nearly three years, her house becomes her sanctuary and cocoon. Her former isolation transforms into a vital strategy as she gradually emerges from it.

A Second Beating Heart is not just a story of isolation, but also of healing and emancipation. The woman finds her way out of the cocoon she has woven around herself. This photo book tells of her journey, which is not only a physical, but also an emotional and spiritual healing. It is a liberation from the ideal of the perfect mother and a testament to the power of personal growth.

Rabea Edel (born 1982 in Bremerhaven) is a writer (“A Dark Moment”) and a graduate of the Ostkreuz School of Photography in Berlin. In “A Second Beating Heart,” she finds images for “the birth of a mother,” as the accompanying text states. The images are carefully staged and at times reminiscent of Victorian interiors, yet they feel intimate and capture the conflicting emotions after the birth of a child; the certainty of never again being solely responsible for oneself.

– monopol Magazine (online 08.12.21)