Exhibition ‘The People beside the Animals in Sofia Zoo’ opens on November 22
An exhibition entitled “The People beside the Animals in Sofia Zoo” opens on November 22, featuring photographs by Marcel Fens and Catherine Zareva – Simeonova, and will continue until March 2016.
The exhibition opens on Sunday at 11.30am at the “Big cats, terrarium and aquarium” hall. The photos, by Dutch photographer Fens and Zareva-Simeonova, show the emotional connection between animals and their keepers at the Zoo in Sofia. The exhibition is a look behind the scenes, beyond the formal relations and obligations of the zoo.
“Being an animal keeper in a zoo is one of the most special, interesting and challenging professions, enjoying popularity worldwide. They are the closest humans to the animals in the zoo and a key figure in their successful breeding and rearing. Animals cannot speak, but their keepers need to understand them and have a strong relationship with them,” Sofia Zoo said in a media statement.
Sofia Zoo is open from 8am to 5pm, with the ticket office open until 4.30pm.
Fens’s book of photos, “The Beautiful Stray Dogs of Sofia” will be published by Four Paws Bulgaria next week and by Four Paws Netherlands a week later.
Marcel came to Bulgaria in 2008 and lives in Sofia. From the beginning, he was amazed not only by Bulgaria’s beautiful scenery and weather, but also that there were so many stray animals in the country’s capital, in contrast to the Netherlands.
As an animal lover, Marcel quickly gained sympathy for the stray animals, and concerned by negative media coverage about the issue, which concentrates only on negative episodes, began in 2013 a photo project to show that many street animals are harmless and have a healthy life.
“These pictures are proof that most stray animals are just beautiful animals,” according to a description of Marcel’s project. Since 2013, he has been a voluntary photographer for Four Paws and since 2014, for Sofia Zoo.
(Photos: Marcel Fens)
