Jörg Sasse - Texte
[ Start ]
[ Texte ]




From the catalogue 'Homebase'.

The catalogue was published on the occasion of the exibitions 'Homebase' at the Kunsthalle Nürnberg and Kai 10 | Arthena Foundation in Düsseldorf.

Washbasins, tablecloths, pot plants, door handles, electric cables, pendant lamps, wallpapers, curtains, porcelain figures, upholstered furniture, radiators, flights of stairs and, again and again, tiles: since 1983 Jörg Sasse has been taking photos – initially analogue, later digital as well – in private living rooms. His photos show what we are surrounded by every day: the world of profane objects with which we live and furnish ourselves. At first glance, the motifs resemble scenarios found by chance, composed by everyday life. But a second look reveals the complexity of the pictorial composition: although there are some intersections with the outside world, every motif appears as a self-contained system. Jörg Sasse depicts the inexhaustible cosmos of everyday objects and architectonic details in reduced, sometimes almost abstract compositions. Concentrated photographically, every detail, every colour, form, structure and materiality develops significance, and the familiar objects that our gaze would pass over without pause in everyday life are given an almost iconic presence by the narrow picture section selected: they turn into protagonists, stars of the stage. Several hundred shots from private living rooms – together with photos of display windows and from public buildings – meanwhile constitute a group of works continued for three decades, which Jörg Sasse collects under the generic heading “Still Life”. While this series consists entirely of his own photographs, in other work groups – in his “Tableaus”, “Lost Memories” and “Stores” – Sasse also uses found amateur photographs, acquiring them through Internet auction houses, at flea markets, or in the context of house clearances, and then processing them at the computer. In his conceptual handling of images, Jörg Sasse, who sees himself as a fine artist using the medium of photography for his work, poses the question of the relationship between photography and reality, the construction of memory, and the changeability of reality as seen through photography. All digitally undertaken alterations, therefore, should not be seen as manipulation of the original image; instead, they represent a further development of the original photo into a new, independent image in regard to its colours, forms and correspondences.

Harriet Zilch, 2016


Link zur Ausstellung