WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE (SAG MIR, WO DIE BLUMEN SIND)
Cologne, Germany
This documentary work traces the transformation of a living space on the outskirts of Cologne, situated on the former Madaus site. Founded in 1919, the pharmaceutical company Madaus was internationally known for producing herbal remedies and natural medicines. For decades, its factory grounds shaped not only the industrial but also the social landscape of this part of the city.
After the company’s relocation and the gradual dismantling of the factory, the terrain entered a new chapter of urban history. What once was a place of production and labor has now turned into a residential area, an environment of private lives, domesticity, and everyday rituals. Many of the streets bear the names of plants once cultivated here, such as Am Sonnenhut, Hibiskusweg, or Hopfenstraße, keeping a quiet memory of the site’s former gardens alive.
The photographic series, begun in the spring of 2022 and continued as part of a long-term project by Oxana Guryanova, reflects on this shift: from industry to intimacy, from collective workspaces to personal living rooms. Plants-present, absent, or metaphorically reimagined-become a recurring motif, appearing in architecture, in domestic interiors, and in subtle details of everyday life.
The title, borrowed from Marlene Dietrich’s haunting interpretation of “Sag mir, wo die Blumen sind”, resonates with the site’s layered memory. In this context, it is not a direct anti-war statement, but a metaphor for disappearance and return. Like the flowers in the song, factories, histories, and ways of life vanish-only to reappear in other forms, altered and reimagined.
