Right from the very beginning I knew that this was going to be difficult. I'm German myself, and I knew that my fellow Germans would not like letting the outside world look at their possessions in the Big Picture because that would be telling the world what their income is. I thought it would be much easier if an American photographer tried to convince them, but it ended up being me anyway. As I imagined, it was hard to find the family--I owe a huge debt to the marvelously kind Pfitzners.
The logistics of scheduling meant that we had to take the Big Picture during Carnival, which meant in turn that we had to convince the city of Cologne to let us close the street during the busiest holiday of the year. Finally they did, and then the area was hit by a cold snap--10F (minus 12C). A few weeks before, I had thrown out my back, and so that morning I swallowed who knows how many painkillers and started unloading furniture in a light snow.
Fortunately, it was so cold that the snow did no damage to the Pfitzner's things--we just blew it off. When it finally stopped we brought out the good furniture. The wind immediately knocked over the first piece we put on the sidewalk. Crash! I cringed, but again we were lucky; no damage.
Ultimately, we had to have people standing behind all of the big pieces of furniture to prevent the wind from blowing them over. We shot one-and-a-half rolls, warmed up for two hours, then shot two more rolls. The only casualties were one inexpensive shelf, which we replaced, and a pot of the family's flowers, which to my horror died immediately. Throughout, the Pfitzners were very relaxed. The smiles in the photograph are real--all the anxieties were mine.
