Norbert Vogel (1944–2023) was one of the great East German photographers. People and their environment were the defining themes he explored, for example in Leipzig. Vogel depicts his city – now, according to surveys, one of the most liveable cities in Europe – shrouded in thick smog during the final years of the GDR. The grey backdrops of the urban landscape appear as a frozen, almost lifeless environment. The photographs highlight the serious ecological and economic problems; they show a city on the brink of collapse. With formal rigour and an eye for detail, Vogel succeeds in capturing, from the bleakness of the late GDR, a harrowing portrait of the period just before the upheaval of 1989.