Identical twins: a portrait, two people!

2015

The second self: Looks like a human, but two!

Same eyes, same nose, same hair - no question: Identical twins are eye catchers. How similar they really are is now impressively illustrated by a photo project.

A total of 1.6 million twins are in Germany . Ascending trend. One quarter of them are one. And when we meet a pair of twins, we have to look at one thing above all: look! But where does she come from - this fascination for identical twins ? Maybe it's because they look so much alike. The reason: Two babies are born from one fertilized egg. They come with exactly the same genetic make-up to the world and do not differ externally by anything. At most by tiny little things. How tiny these really are, shows impressively the picture series "Living Copies?" of the photographer Dennis Möbus .

For his double portraits, Möbius photographed 13 pairs of twins separated from each other. At the computer, the portraits of the siblings were then put together. The left face is the one identical twin, the right the other. The result: A fascinating proof of how similar identical twins actually look. The work originated as part of his diploma thesis in communication design at the University of Darmstadt.

Photographer Möbius wants to show how different, but also how identical identical twins can be and where the differences and similarities lie. Not only did he take pictures of the twins, he also did interviews. "However, the question quickly comes up here: is each and every one really unique and how difficult is it to find one's identity as an identical twin?" Writes the 28-year-old. His conclusion: "The results are amazing, because the faces appear as if it were actually a real person." Only on closer inspection are smallest differences in the two halves of the face recognizable. " A summary, which draw many of the twin couples from the photo project: In the interview, everyone agrees to have their own identity well developed. In addition, however, you always have a plus one beside you. A person with whom he associates something special. And that's definitely more than the look.