SITUATIONS #31: Oskar Schmidt, Liquid
6 February – 3 April 2016
Large quantities of
pre-made, finely polished studio portraits and high-gloss product shots are
available on the Internet for (free) use through digital image databases and
stock photography agencies. These types of authorless photographs are mainly
used by editors and agencies as starting material for other imaging processes
and are tailored to meet different needs. Oskar Schmidt’s photo objects are
created as a clear reference to this photographed or animated imagery. The
artist makes use of the rhetoric and aesthetics of everyday photography,
transforming them into a clear artistic statement. By copying the variables of production
and distribution almost down to the end product and only then investing it with
a complex aura, a space for interpretation opens up to viewers that hold more
than one “photographic” truth. (Text: Thomas Seelig)