London Art Fair 2018 with Photo50

Over the last thirty years, London Art Fair presenting leading British and international galleries alongside curated spaces Art Projects and Photo50. This year’s edition of Photo50, titled Resolution is not the point., is curated by Hemera Collective, the first collective to curate London Art Fair’s annual exhibition of photography.

17 – 21 January 2018

londonartfair.co.uk/whats-on/photo50/

Back to the Future

Karl Blossfeldt » BOWNIK » Matthew Brandt » Sam Falls » Spiros Hadjidjanos » Nicolai Howalt » Adam Jeppesen » Thomas Mailaender » ...

Opening: foam.org/museum/programme/public-opening

Exhibition Back to the Future: foam.org/museum/programme/back-to-the-future

Theo Simpson » Part and Whole

Opening: foam.org/museum/programme/public-opening

Exhibition Theo Simpson: foam.org/museum/programme/theo-simpson

Donata Wenders » "Gelesene Zeit"

With her photographs, the artist Donata Wenders (b. Berlin, 1965) has often tried to expound upon the light that just barely shines through the cracks. "In my photographs," she says, "I am only interested in what can be seen between the lines – what pulls you back again and again, pushing us forward, towards a new clarity."

Wenders takes photographs that appear as jewel-like, visual poems. Delicate treasures in a world of big claims and loud voices. In these pictures, the artist makes no irrefutable argument. There are no theses. No world views. Rather, these photographs are sketches of the allure of the unspeakable; of an overlooked nuance left for eternity in one single frame of time. Donata Wenders' photographs open up associations. They leave you unsettled. They stir questions; they are the stepping stones to significant reflection. What happens when the light of our age illuminates the very darkness of our being? What should our lives reflect? Upon whom do we spend our time reflecting?

So, in the end, it's always about the light. Donata Wenders says that this light exists as a kind of teacher, a master. In each of her photographs, the light takes over the direction. Through the y…

Gerard Petrus Fieret » G. P. Fieret

Gerard Petrus Fieret (1924 – 2009) was born in Den Haag (The Hague) in the Netherlands where he worked and spent his life, except for the year 1943 when he was transported to Germany and worked as a forced labourer. After a year and a half, Fieret was able to escape and continue his bohemian life as an artist and poet in his hometown. In 1959 Fieret acquired a pre-owned 35mm Praktiflex SLR, and shifted to photography as his main source of artistic expression pursuing a career in portrait and street photography.

In his hometown, Fieret was a well-known public figure. He met his "models", or rather everyday women, on the streets and in cafés. The photographs shown at Galerie Julian Sander were shot in the 1960s and -70s, when Fieret focused on portraying women in black-and-white silver gelatine prints. Besides self-portraits of the artist, these portraits constitute the main subject in Fierets œuvre. The women are staged in any possible manner, sometimes in very unusual poses, very often as nudes. Although some of the pictures are explicitly erotic, all the photographs show his personal relation to the models and are the result of a free-spirited workflow, as Fieret allowed them to move freely and be themselves. The artists affection for his Models is translated into the photos, thus saving them from being pornographic and mirroring beautifully the liberal spirit of the time.

It is said that Fieret was afraid of theft and copyright infringement throughout his career a…

Hiro »

ANALOG

Susanna Kraus » Valentina Murabito »

The extraordinary thing about Valentina Murabito's (* 1981) photographic works is that she creates fantastical intermediates in the darkroom. In the exhibition she will present people with beaks ("The Blue Hour") or peaceful goats, who become fighting bulls, as in "Vite sacre". She draws inspiration from mythology and philosophy. Her discovery after 15 years of experimenting in the darkroom allows her to create these beautiful creatures. In the history of photography, it has only been possible to modify the surface by scratching, scratching, tearing or sewing. Murabito dissolves the photosensitive layer, i. Photo emulsion, from paper and reshaping. Something as impossible as photo paper and photo emulsion become one. In addition, the Italian photographer developed her works on different materials, such as wood, concrete, steel or entire walls and integrated, as a fresco in the church, in the architecture. In Munich, she will show works on wood, steel and large format watercolor paper. Valentina Murabito studied in Catania / Italy and Budapest / Hungary at the Kunsthochschule and today lives as a freelance artist in Berlin.

Susanna Kraus (* 1957) uses the world's only analogue direct image camera, the IMAGO Camera, which creates 1: 1 human images. The exhibition will only show works that, like the series "Alice", were created with the IMAGO Camera. In "Alice" Kraus interprets the search for the identity of the protagonist from "Alice in Wonderland". Together with Annegret Kohlmeyer, the artist removed flowers and plants from their surroundings and colors, turning them, as in "Tulips IV", into artificial objects full of intensity and gloom. Her father, Werner Kraus, invented the camera in 1970 on behalf of Daimler-Benz to include technical methods and further developed it with the sculptor Erhard Hößle. In the IMAGO camera, the photograph is created by direct exposure on a silver gelatin direct positive paper and on a scale of 1:1. Immediately after the exposure, the resulting original is developed in a chemical process.1978 the production of the paper was discontinued. In 2006, Susanna Kraus was able to convince ILFORD to reissue the direct positive paper and align it with her artistic needs. The exhibition shows prints of the original. Susanna Kraus studied at the renowned Otto Falckenberg drama school, played 25 years i.e in the Kammerspiele in Munich, before she learned the craft of IMAGO Camera as an autodidact. She continues to play in films and lives in Berlin.

Michael Eastman » Buenos Aires - Southern Light

The exhibition features unexpected photographs of iconic interiors in Buenos Aires. It is natural that Michael Eastman, whose works tell stories through the details of interiors located throughout the world, found rich material and inspiration in this city. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Buenos Aires staged ambitious and extravagant architectural projects to brandish its wealth, its stunning architecture helping the city earn its nickname “the Paris of South America.” Latin America’s tallest building and a series of neoclassical palaces were amongst the feats the city boasted. While Buenos Aires proudly retains this legacy today, still teeming with examples of architectural achievement from its belle époque, many of its buildings show signs of the country’s recent political and economic hardships. Eastman’s series illuminates how these interiors, captured a century after their heyday, have not dimmed with time but rather become more intriguing in their age.

At the heart of each photograph is an essential element of surprise: an electric blue light illuminating the doorway of a classic palace, the psychedelic twist of a spiral staircase, the blazing reflection of light in an entirely golden theater. These details dazzle, but equally important is what is absent from these photographs. Each interior is largely devoid of contemporary design, technology, and, somewhat hauntingly, inhabitants. A college stairwell transport…

Seb Janiak » KINGDOM

Niels Ackermann & Sébastien Gobert »

Looking for Lenin

Having witnessed the protests that took place in Maidan Square, Niels Ackermann and Sébastien Gobert went on a quest for a major symbol of a country’s communist past: statues of Lenin. For two years, the duo photographed close to 70 statues and conducted as many interviews with their guardians and owners. This series unfolds in front of the viewer like a documentary-inventory, in a combination of unusual shots and accounts.

This exhibition was produced in partnership with Fotostiftung Schweiz. In 2017, it was shown at the Rencontres d’Arles and was the subject of a book published by Fuel Publishing (Editions Noir sur Blanc for the French version).

Willy Spiller » Street Life: NY/LA 1977-1985

It is this that ensures his place in the annals of great Swiss photography. Like many of the resonating names before him, he managed to translate empathy into form through strength of will. Or, as his long-time friend and companion Paul Nizon so aptly put it: "I've often asked myself what made Willy Spiller's photography so forthright, so refreshing and so riveting. I believe it's a blend of unabashed curiosity and roguish complexity combined with a fraternal sense of compassion. It isn't something you learn at school: it's more a question of class, of predisposition, and ultimately of character. Behind the swashbuckling, wheeler-dealing façade is a dreamer, a man hungry for life and beauty. And that is the reason he sides with humanity, which is just another way of saying that he had an innate love of mankind. That is the way he sees things. And it is driven by a highly developed artistic energy."