A bearded pipe-smoker with a wooden leg and a parrot on one shoulder? Or a penniless Somali fisherman who has lost his income to overfishing trawlers from the EU? Pirates have many faces. Challenge your preconceptions in the exhibition Who is a pirate?
The exhibition is open until May 31th 2012.
In it you will meet historical pirates – the Vitalie brothers, 14th century harriers of the Baltic, and the pirates who made the west coast of Sweden unsafe in the 18th century. Pirates that often carried letters of marque and reprisal – a royal authorisation to capture the enemy’s vessels and cargo.
The Mediterranean was plagued by pirates for hundreds of years, and European nations were forced into agreements with the pirate princes in order to obtain free passage for their ships.
Modern pirates
Who is a pirate? is also an exhibition of today’s pirates who hijack merchant vessels in the Gulf of Aden and off the coast of Somalia. These pirates have made headlines all over the world.
Piracy usually occurs in areas of poverty, war and political instability. Somalia is a country with favourable conditions for pirates.
Somalia has been fighting a civil war for almost 20 years. It has a weak central government. There is no security for the starving civilian population, which is subjected to the militias of various clan leaders, Islamist groups, perpertrators and robbers in a lawless country.
Off the coast, foreign fishing boats fish illegally and dump toxic waste. The lanes travelled by the merchant vessels are poorly protected, and the ships are easy targets.
It is a desperate situation – in which many are forced into life as a pirate.
Get a unique insight into the everyday life of modern pirates with documentary films and images.