NO WORDS
365 Days in the Darkroom
February 24th, 2022 – February 23rd, 2023
A daily photographic ritual.
For those who have overcome their fear, liberated their spirit and stood up to the autocrats, liars and despots of this world, this project is dedicated.
In the basement, in a sparsely furnished darkroom, I began to expose the same motif on old photographic paper seemingly endlessly. I count the days and paint the numbers with a brush soaked in fixative on the exposed but not yet developed photographic paper. A daily photographic ritual.
Like a shaman, I drive away all shame, helplessness and hatred
in this ritual photographic process of constantly repeating exposures of the same negative: women’s hands holding a blank sheet of paper. A gesture of protest, a symbol for all protests. Sometimes during development I expose the photographic papers to white light, which produces the effect of solarisation.
The positive becomes a negative in places
The images are only watered very briefly, but NOT fixed enough.
Therefore, the process of “destruction” begins immediately after the photo is taken.
The image, under the influence of light, changes permanently, randomly and irreversibly over the years. The scans (shown below on this page) made of the individual images reflect the state of the photo immediately after its creation.
No Words” was shortlisted for the Felix Schoeller Photo Award in the category “German Peace Prize for Photography” in 2023.
Exhibition view, 2023. 365 unfixed contact prints ranging in size from 13 x 18 cm to 18 x 24 cm. Total size approximately 250 cm x 400 cm.
