This summer’s major exhibition at the Nederlands Fotomuseum is the ambitious new project by the Dutch documentary photographer Ad van Denderen, who was awarded the prestigious Œuvre Prize by the Nederlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture (Fonds BKVB) in early 2008. His project So Blue, So Blue – Edges of the Mediterranean presents a photographic impression of the region around the Mediterranean Sea that is a far cry from the images etched on the retina of the average toursist. Van Denderen has been travelling through the 17 countries that surround the Mediterranean Sea on a regular basis since 2003, in order to capture the political, social, economic and ecological changes. This vast area is under considerable pressure, from the rapidly growing tourism industry on the one hand and from the tensions it is facing due to its geopolitical situation on the other. This is, after all, where Northern Africa, the Middle East and Southern Europe meet : regions marked by political, cultural and religious diffferences. The 17 countries in So Blue, So Blue – Edges of the Mediterranean are Gribraltar, Spain, France, Italy, Croatia, Albania, Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israël and the occupied territories, Egypt, Lybia, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco.