Galleria Suzy Shammah

Michael Schmidt

5 May - 25 Jun. 2011

Untitled (from Landschaft), 2007
gelatin Silver print
104,9 x 127,7 cm

The Suzy Shammah Gallery presents a new solo show by German artist Michael Schmidt. The exhibition displays a selection of photographs from the series 89/90, taken during the autumn/winter of 1989-90 in the surroundings of the old Berlin wall. Extracted from the artist's wide archive after more than twenty years, and recently published in his latest book, these images stand in the gallery space beside a single nature photograph depicting a snowy and enchanted landscape.

Schmidt's photographs - strictly black and white - in 89/90 linger over the architecture of the city that was once divided and then reunited. The wall, symbol of an era that has just partially disappeared, offers the opportunity to develop a detailed analysis of the capital and its relationship with history. By using seemingly banal glimpses, the artist deals with the theme of memory, involving the observer by underhand means, as though it were an archaeological dig carried out through the use of images and plunged into silence.

Between details and totality, close-ups and panoramic views, each photograph represents the element of a wider constellation. The edges of the images are not to be interpreted as frames that mark the boundaries of a closed and self-sufficient universe, but rather as porous borders that interact with the surrounding elements. This attitude becomes clear in Schmidt's special and personal installation layout, where the juxtaposition of the photographs continuously generates new meanings to understand the complexity of reality.