Torschlusspanik

What if you felt you hadn’t done enough in life? What if opportunities kept slipping away from you?

“Torschlusspanik” is a German term that can be literally translated as “closing door panic”. It denotes the escalating fear or anxiety when one feels that opportunities are dwindling, hindering them from finding a partner, having children, or achieving professional successes.This word, likely conceived in medieval times when being locked out of a city’s gate could mean death during a siege, is presented here in its most literal sense.

The young woman rushes toward the gate, but it’s all in vain: the passage has perhaps been closed for some time. Her hair, tousled by the wind - a symbol of her very essence - tries to intertwine with the bars, hoping to pass through, yearning for the freedom represented by the seascape.

She gazes into our eyes as if warning us: it’s a plea to give our all, to break free from the shackles of a life not truly our own, to pass through our own personal gate and attain our happiness.