Jerry Berndt: Protests and patriotism in America

This picture was taken by Jerry Berndt in 1970 at a demonstration in Detroit where students protested against the Vietnam War. The US flag is conspicuously carried upside down, which according to the US flag code stands for a military emergency. A clear positioning of the demonstrators against the war.

Jerry Berndt's photographic career has focused on the political currents and movements in the US. These include the fears of a threat from Communist China, omnipresent during the Cold War and the Vietnam War. Even today, fear of China is central political theme, with President Trump in particular engaging in a trade war with the country.

In his photo essays, Jerry Berndt often focused on the social condition of the northeastern United States, where he himself grew up. He portrays the social and economic realities of postwar inhabitants against the dreary backdrop of America's big industrial cities. This picture of four youths was taken in 1971 in Detroit, a city struggling with widespread crime and poverty even then.

The national flag is part of everyday life in an often parochial nation. It can be seen in flying in the yards of neighborhood homes, in front of supermarkets, even at kindergartens. This picture shows a parade of patriotic US Americans in Detroit in 1972, with the "Star-Spangled Banner," as the American flag is known, in the foreground.

Inspired by the success of the anti-nuclear movement in Germany, several hundred demonstrators gathered at the construction site of a nuclear power plant in Seabrook, north of Boston, on August 1, 1976. Photographer Jerry Berndt himself was often part of these protests and documented them with his roving camera. (Text adaptation: Stuart Braun)