Eva Leitolf was already developing and perfecting her photographic style in this first, larger-scale work. Her pictures are precise and describe in detail the artist's exploration of place. Although her work is socially critical in its approach, she never overtly takes sides or makes pointed accusations. Her pictures hover between artistic independence and sociological relevance. Each photograph exists in its own right, but her photos gain their suggestive power, above all, when they are shown as a series. Eva Leitolf circles her theme doggedly, picture after picture, and her doggedness is unsparing. Yet her photographs never become loud or obvious. They possess a strange kind of silence, a gnawing silence that unleashes a sense of unease in the viewer and raises questions.
In the mid-1990s Eva Leitolf moved to the United States and expanded her artistic interests into the medium of video, creating extensive works on the Californian suburbs and on the theme of nature. She was awarded a number of prestigious prizes and her work was exhibited widely. It was not until 2004 that she returned to the theme of 'Looking for Evidence', and then with a rather different slant. In her first series, the viewer was able to call to mind images from the press and the television and use them as a supplementary source of information or as a point of comparison. Yet this was not possible in her new series from Namibia, called 'Rostock Ritz'. It seems the events to which the artist is referring lie too far back in the past. It is as if they are too far removed from the reality of contemporary Germany. The viewer is forced to glean all of the information from the pictures by himself or herself. Eva Leitolf is aware of this fact and reacts in a surprising manner. She reduces the narrative elements and, at the same time, creates atmospherically condensed pictures that tell a story, but without reporting facts.
The front cover of the book shows two white men who are out hunting, accompanied by a third man, who is black. The two white men are decorated with all the requisite insignia; they are wearing safari-style clothes and have binoculars with which to observe the game, as well as rifles to kill it. The black African who can be seen between them has no weapons and is not really involved in the enterprise. He is, no doubt, what is referred to as a 'boy' and is there to help on the hunting expedition by preparing meals or fetching the dead game. In the composition of her picture, Eva Leitolf exposes the social hierarchies. She shows us the predicament of the third man as he follows the goings-on with apparent indifference. If you look at other pictures in which whites, most of them Namibians of German descent, are depicted, you get the impression that they completely take for granted their presence in this country that has been domesticated according to their ideas. Their body language is self-assured and territorial. Their farmhouses and ranches are clearly delimited and defined. Their social interaction is determined by customs and rituals that originate from their German homeland and from which the black Namibians are excluded.