Pier to Pier

200 years ago, the first bathing houses were placed on the beach of Scheveningen, a coastal town near The Hague, Netherlands. They marked the start of the modern local sea-bathing culture. However, all those years ago, Scheveningen was mainly a poor fishing village. My family name ‘Van der Zwan’ is well-known in Scheveningen. Here, my grandfather had a fish shop and 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 as a child just after the war. It was this contradiction that made me decide to delve deeper with my camera into the contemporary Scheveningen. I keep coming back to the beach, the boulevard and the pier to visualize the local bathing and beach culture. ‘Pier to Pier’ is about everything that happens on the 2,5 kilometers of beach and boulevard between the northern fishing pier and the pleasure pier of Scheveningen. It is here, on these ‘hunting grounds’ that I like to capture the almost inexhaustible flow of day trippers in a striking way. With lots of color and flash and preferably an extra element; something recognizable or something weird. Whether it is surprise, pleasure, endearment or indignation, I want to release emotion with the people who watch my images.