Schöne Welt, 1994–97

The photo collages were all done by taking lots of overlapping shots of the same motif. The negatives were developed in very cheap drugstore laboratories, which resulted in prints that would one day be greenish, the other day bluish, depending on how long the chemicals had been used. Sometimes I had to have the same motif printed several times to get a workable color palette. The final image consisted of anything from a few to a hundred different prints, all cut out so that they would fit together like a puzzle, and then glued onto foam board or wood.

Within the resulting image, the original view on the motif could be distorted in perspective; colors shifted constantly and there could also be a movement in time, with one figure appearing several times in the same picture.

 
Strandbild (Beach Picture), 1994-95
This was shot on one of the beaches in Poland that we used to go to, back in the days when people would wear very colorful sportswear even if they were old. In this picture, a grandmother and a little girl are moving from the beach to the stairs on the right, while a boy is playing by himself on the left hand side. The pole in the center reveals this peaceful scene’s false perspective to the spectator.
Im Wasserfall (In the Waterfall), 1995-97
This bucolic picture shows my boyfriend inside the water of one of my childhood places – a waterfall in the mountains of the Lago di Como, where my grandmother owns a tiny hut. A male bathing nymph.
Herbst (Autumn), 1996-97
This image is very romantic in a lot of ways – the crossroads, the ruins, autumn etc.”my wanderings will take me to the place none of us knows, no matter if I choose right or left.” The picture was taken in Poland, inside a military training ground, onto which we had ventured by chance. The “church” in the woods is actually a concrete structure that acts as a kind of decoy, faking the presence of a village for the eyes of enemy pilots.
Am Fluss (At the Riverside), 1995
Taken near Madrid, this picture shows some boys trying their climbing skills at a bridge.The dirty water gleams golden in the afternoon sun, while a young girl looks down at the boys. From a big election poster in the background, the candidate watches us all.
Stadt (City), 1995-97
A Parisian suburb is spanned by a wonderful, two-tiered rainbow. Gentilly has had a communist mayor ever since 1934, the only exception was during the time of the Vichy regime. Carmen Le Roux ruled it for twenty years and tried her best to avoid the problems of other banlieues. It is a suburb for workers and people with low salaries, but a lot of attempts were made to keep it a nice, quiet, rather green place. My best friend lived in one of the communal apartments and I stayed with her quite often and got to know the area well.
Hütte (Hut), 1994
Hütte is a single photo of a hut I saw in Berlin’s Grünewald.
See also:  Twigs, 2001
Alexa Hennig von Lange: Interior Worlds

 

 

Texts:
Ingo Niermann: Beautiful World [eng]
Ingo Niermann: Schöne Welt [dt]
Exhibitions:
Made in Berlin, House of Cyprus, Athens, Greece, 1999
Made in Berlin, Rethymnon Centre for Contemporary Art, Crete, Greece, 1998
Beautiful World, Goethe Institute Manchester; Goethe Institute Gallery,
London, England, 1997
Schöne Welt (With Ulrike Kuschel and Andrea Rostásy), Neuer Berliner Kunstverein, Berlin, 1996
Catalogues
Friedrich Meschede, Schöne Welt, Neuer Berliner Kunstverein, Berlin / 1997
Birgit Hoffmeister, Made in Berlin, House of Cyprus, Rethymon Centre of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece / 1999
Hütte (Hut), 1994
C-print, foam board mount, wood, Plexiglas cover, 67,5 x 48 cm
Im Wasserfall (In the Waterfall), 1995-97
C-print collage, foam board mount, painted wood, Plexiglas cover, 132 x 135 cm

Stadt (City), 1995-97
C-print collage, foam board mount, painted wood, Plexiglas cover, 75 x 169 cm
Strandbild (Beach Picture), 1994-95
C-print collage, foam board mount, painted wood, Plexiglas cover, 92 x 233 cm