Review: ‘Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst’ at the RMIT Gallery, Melbourne

Exhibition dates: 1st March – 20th April, 2024

Curator: Matthias Flügge

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Dodendorfer Straße
1998
Aus der Serie: Morgenstraße. Magdeburg 1998-2000
From the series: Morgenstraße. Magdeburg 1998-2000
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Wondering through history

Wonder noun. a feeling of amazement and admiration, caused by something beautiful, remarkable, or unfamiliar.

As enunciated by Jake Wilson in The Age newspaper in a review of the film La Chimera, “ultimately, the problem dramatised here is the same one faced by any modern artist: how do you retain a meaningful link to your predecessors while shaping something new?”1

Further, my mentor and friend Ian Lobb would often challenge me to define what I was adding to the artistic dialogue of photography instead of repeating the language of a previous era, and I would spar with him asking him was it really necessary to constantly reinvent the wheel, was it not enough to see and feel with clarity and humour those precious moments that surround us, and insightfully photograph them. These are the questions that enliven life: is it always necessary to shape something new, or is it enough to be attentive to the moment – of your mind, heart and vision – to create spellbinding photographs that carry your own interpretation of a certain reality.

Such is the case with the stimulating, two-room exhibition of the German photographer Ulrich Wüst at RMIT Gallery, Melbourne.

Wüst’s photography shows great affinity with the work of Bernd and Hiller Becher and the Becher and Dusseldorf Schools of photography which would have been known in East Germany by the time Wüst shot the 1980s series Stadtbilder. 1979-1985 (Cityscapes. 1979-1985) that first brought Wüst to international attention (the border was very permeable to artistic ideas from the West reaching East Germany).2 Indeed, most of Wüst’s oeuvre has direct links to the aesthetic of the Bechers (with their attention to detail and “devotion to the 1920s German tradition of Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity”) and photographers such as Thomas Ruff (with their surreal enlargement of scale and “fundamentally sceptical attitude towards photography’s claim to truth and documentation”).

I believe that referencing and riffing off that aesthetic as Wüst does is no bad thing … for it forms the basis for the photographer’s further take on reality. But there are plenty of other forces at play in his photographs. I observe traces of August Sander, Berenice Abbott, Robert Frank, Michael Schmidt and Eugène Atget among others, especially with the latter in the positioning of Wüst’s camera.

As he observes, “When shooting I often find that if I move just fraction away from the more customary perspective a subtle heightening of tension with take place within the image. It’s no accident that I and my camera frequently get suspicious looks when the angle of the lens shifts away from the perspective found in souvenirs and postcards.” (Wall text from the exhibition)

And this is exactly what Atget did, he moved his camera from the “normal” point of view ever so slightly so that there immediately becomes this tension within the image plane coupled to the possibility of a magical revelation of space, an ironic comment on construction, or a grotesque play of opposites. As Wüst says, his vision, his observation, contains “plenty that is comic, grotesque, ironic” which many people do not see.

If we think about the supposedly objective work of the Bechers, which they insisted was all about documenting the object and not about any type of emotion, we fail to consider, as Julia Curl opines, “that this “objectivity” is only surface-level – that the work is deeply personal, even if its apparent uniformity claims otherwise.”3 Personally, I have never bought into the cool objectification of the Becher’s work for the photographers made defined choices as to how they depicted their constructed realities, each iteration of a water tower, gravel plant or cooling tower different from the other (fragments of a whole). This was deeply personal vision of how the world is perceived.

The same can be said of the photographs of Ulrich Wüst. His photographs are entirely personal, fragmentary excavations of history. In Wüst’s works by series, his photographs – surreal, sculptural scenes absent of people, full of elemental beauty – are not just the flawed humanity of our creation / the creation of our flawed humanity … but the creation and imagination of the human mind captured by the eye of the camera. Wüst’s photographs challenge us to look closer at the reality around us not accepting the status quo, the postcard view, not walking the city as if unaware of the vistas around us, feeling the “traces, injuries, missing and empty spaces in the image, so that things begin to speak of themselves…”4

As the art historian Matthias Flügge states, Wüst’s photographs are “images of intellectual-spatial situations,” wholly a creation, an accretion, on existing forms of photography. Not something new, which is ultimately unnecessary, but a growth in “wondering” – not wandering – achieved through the gradual accumulation of additional layers of beauty, feeling, knowledge so that we are informed and fully aware of our (un)familiar surroundings.

The photographs tell a powerful story of Germany before and after the fall of communism whilst instilling in the viewer a wondering, an accumulation and visual nourishment for the senses.

Such is the photography of Ulrich Wüst.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

PS. The only down side to this exhibition is that all the black and white photographs are modern archival ink jet prints. Call me old fashioned but these pigment prints have no real “presence”. It’s like the difference between an LP and a CD, or a movie in Technicolor or 5K. One has “atmosphere”, one has mood and aura and the other just sits there in all its perfection like a dog with a bone waiting for you to go “oooh, ahhh”. There are people that say you can’t tell the difference between the two. Rubbish. Give me gelatin silver prints any day of the week.

1/ Jake Wilson. “Lost and Found while digging up the cinematic past,” in The Age newspaper, 11 April 2024, p. 24.

2/”Huyssen reveals the complexity of artistic development on both sides of the Wall and notes that “the borders between East and West became porous during the 1970s as a result of treaties between the GDR and the FRG.” His focus in this regard, however, is on those artists who left the East for the West and made an impact there, such as Georg Baselitz and Gerhard Richter; he does not acknowledge the extent to which ideas and influences went in both directions. … While it is true that West German artists showed little interest in exhibiting in the East or in the art that was created there, East German artists tended to be well informed about Western artistic developments…” p. 598

April A. Eisman. “East German Art and the Permeability of the Berlin Wall,” in German Studies Review, Vol. 38, No. 3 (October 2015), pp. 597-616. Published by The Johns Hopkins University Press on behalf of the German Studies Association

3/ Julia Curl. “Bernd and Hilla Becher’s Misunderstood Oeuvre,” on the Hyperallergic website November 2, 2022 [Online] Cited 11/04/2024

4/ Jacek Slaski. “Ulrich Wüst – Stadtbilder 1979–1985: Zwischen Kunst und Dokumentation,” on the tipBerlin website 03/02/2022 [Online] Cited 08/04/2024. Translated from the German by Google Translate

Many thankx to the RMIT Gallery and the ifa for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

An exhibition by ifa – Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen e.V., Stuttgart – in partnership with the Goethe-Institut. This project is an official exhibition of PHOTO 2024 International Festival of Photography.

“Most viewers, unfortunately, are so dreadfully serious when they look at the pictures. I have to “hammer it home” incredibly hard before anyone will allow themselves to laugh. In my works there is simply – perhaps a bit hidden – plenty that is comic, grotesque, ironic.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

“I’m sure I do give those power symbols the aesthetic treatment, otherwise it’s unlikely that I would have any desire or energy to photograph them. But it would also be unfair to say that these objects do not hold their own innate aesthetic fascination. All I can do is try to describe how I am torn between spontaneous fascination and rational rejection, aiming to convey that experience and make it understandable. When shooting I often find that if I move just fraction away from the more customary perspective a subtle heightening of tension with take place within the image. It’s no accident that I and my camera frequently get suspicious looks when the angle of the lens shifts away from the perspective found in souvenirs and postcards. People are very attuned to that sort of shift.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Flatland. Schönhof, 2013 (centre), The Pomp of Power, 1983-1990 (left) and Red October, 2018 (right) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst’s photographic work captures his wanderings through German history, portraying the social and urban transformations from the GDR and its disintegration, through the German reunification to the present day. Wüst revives the German history in a new static way, where the past and present clash in a dynamic and ever-changing environment.

Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst shows a selection of nine suites taken between 1978 and 2019. Ulrich Wüst’s photographic work can be contemplated from different perspectives. While the observations captured here are rooted in Germany’s division and its mending, at the same time they always relate to universal phenomena of social change and its material manifestations. The seemingly terse images, extremely precise in their composition, are the fruits of lengthy visual wanderings through present sites of recent history.

Ulrich Wüst’s photographic œuvre, which explores Eastern Germany in the broader sense, is not confined to the sunken GDR. It might be described as a pictorial archaeology of our present day. These pictures reveal the finds from his “excavations” and are at the same time tools of their conservation. Wüst has an infallible feel for the graphic quality of everyday situations, objects and materials, but also for the deeper layers of significance associated with found images. Examples are the enlarged details from East German press products that demonstrate a manipulative use of photography.

Ulrich Wüst’s photographic work can be contemplated from different perspectives. While the observations captured here are essentially rooted in Germany’s division and its mending, at the same time they always relate to universal phenomena of social change and its material manifestations. The seemingly terse images, extremely precise in their composition, are the fruits of lengthy visual wanderings through present sites of recent history.

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Flatland. Schönhof, 2013, from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Flatland. Schönhof
From the series: Flatland. Schönhof
2013
Colour photograph, archival pigment print
57 × 38cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Flatland. Schönhof
From the series: Flatland. Schönhof (installation views)
2013
Colour photograph, archival pigment print
57 × 38cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

“These photographs of newspapers and magazines were taken in the countryside, things that I found within a very small radius. Previously I had always done that urban stuff but then I would go looking for contrasts, because after a while your eye becomes tired.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Cityscapes 1979-1985 (left) and Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege 1991-1992 (right) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst’s photos are “images of mental-spatial situations”

In every city there are places that have been photographed thousands of times. From tourists, amateurs and professionals. Always captured on paper or the digital matrix. Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, Alexanderplatz in the heart of Berlin. Thousands, even millions of looks at the striking symbols of a metropolis that want to capture the essence of the city. Ulrich Wüst was far away from such direct concepts. His view of Alexanderplatz is almost shy, more of a cautious approach, and yet he gets a grip on the place. But it’s not primarily about Berlin. Wüst’s city images are less studies of specific cities than “images of intellectual-spatial situations,” as the art historian and rector of the Dresden University of Fine Arts Matthias Flügge states in his insightful text for the photo book Ulrich Wüst – Stadtbilder 1979-1985 (Ulrich Wüst – City Images 1979-1985).

If you read Flügge’s text, it becomes clear once again that a picture is not just a picture and that it requires more than a fleeting observation, especially with a subject like the cityscape. Because you could easily come to the conclusion that you immediately understand the motif at hand, after all, you yourself are a city dweller and are aware of your habitat. But a photograph is also a starting point for deeper reflections. Wüst’s photographs of prefabricated buildings in East Berlin, vacancies in Magdeburg, and the central square in Karl-Marx-Stadt are not unseen motifs. Rather, they are all too well known. Such urban constellations should not be foreign to anyone who lived in the GDR in the 1970s and 1980s, or even those born later or socialised in the West. …

“Determining the status quo of the constructed, shaped, printed or otherwise produced objective world with all its traces, injuries, missing and empty spaces in the image, so that things begin to speak of themselves,” is what Wüst does, writes Flügge.

Jacek Slaski. “Ulrich Wüst – Stadtbilder 1979–1985: Zwischen Kunst und Dokumentation,” on the tipBerlin website 03/02/2022 [Online] Cited 08/04/2024. Translated from the German by Google Translate

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Berlin
1982
Aus der Serie: Stadtbilder. 1979-1985
From the series: Cityscapes. 1979-1985
B/w archival pigment print
16 x 24cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

“For me it had always been about the built environment. […] And then I started on those rather dry Cityscapes, which always seems so objective, even though they never were and never tried to be. I wanted to take a concentrated, analytical look at the city. Back then I had a strong sense of mission; I really did want to achieve something. And the things I wanted to say about the city as space I also wanted to tell people who weren’t at all interested in photography or urban space. In some respects it was definitely intended to enlighten. Ultimately I wanted to provoke a debate about what we imagine a “city” to be and what this environment does to us.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Axel Hütte (German, b. 1951)
James Hammett House
1982-1984
Silver gelatin print on baryte paper
66 x 80cm
Loan of the artist

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Stadtbilder. 1979-1985
From the series: Cityscapes. 1979-1985 (installation views)
B/w archival pigment print
16 x 24cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

The work of Ulrich Wüst might best be described as a pictorial archaeology of recent German history. With an unsentimental precision these photographic ‘excavations’ pivot around moments of social change; those points in history when the old and the new collide, when the seemingly endless cycle of destruction and construction can so easily relegate the present to the oblivion of the past.

Initially photographing life in the former East Germany, Wüst’s oeuvre grew to include the documentation of everyday situations, objects and materials; expanding further with the addition of found images, cropped and rephotographed by Wüst to reveal alternative readings.

In his sparse black and white Cityscapes, the 1980s series that first brought Wust to international attention, we find images of East German cities and towns still carrying scars from the Second World War – an environment formed through the combination of unchecked decay and Soviet-era reconstruction. With an interest in the absurd – those visual anomalies that arrive through accident or misguided intent – Wüst has forged a unique, non-ideological representation of that time. In a similar manner but on a different scale, Wüst’s Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege (1991-1992) – a photo inventory of objects left behind by the former owner of his house – engages us with the incidental nature of history. Intimate and fragile, these ordinary objects are made monumental through Wüst’s lens, yet these discarded possessions have the same precariousness as the hastily built architecture of cities in perpetual change.

Ulrich Wüst’s photographic work exists as a registry of everyday images. It could be considered akin to the personal archive of a once divided country mending itself, wandering through time, settling upon moments and fragments that also speak to the wider, universal phenomena of social change and its material manifestations.

Wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Cityscapes, 1979-1985 (right), Morgenstraße. Magdeburg, 1998-2000 (second right), Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 (third right) and Red October, 2018 (left) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Morgenstraße. Magdeburg, 1998-2000 (right), Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 (centre left) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Morgenstraße. Magdeburg 1998-2000
From the series: Morgenstraße. Magdeburg 1998-2000 (installation views)
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

“As soon as we see people in pictures, we focus on those people. We seem to be fixated on that somehow and we stare at the figures depicted, however small they may be. But as I wanted to steer attention to the built environment, to what we have built for ourselves, I quite simply decided to leave the people out. If there a no people in sight in the pictures, then for one thing nobody can look at them and for another the effect is disconcerting. Disconcertion is a good opening gambit.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Berenice Abbott (American, 1898-1991)
Fifth Avenue, Nos. 4, 6, 8, Manhattan
March 20, 1936
Gelatin silver print

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Kaffemühle (Coffee grinder)
Aus der Serie: Nachlass Wiegmann. Bülowssiege 1991-1992
From the series: Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege 1991-1992
Colour photograph, archival pigment print
105 cm x 70cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

“I make a point of calling myself a photographer, because then the art question usually no longer arises. But if others still want to see me as an artist, I can (happily) live with that. Personally I don’t want to think about that question. The only thing I do want to stress is that my work is not documentary. I use documentary technique as a form, as a means, and in certain works I am also looking for documentary precision.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Nachlass Wiegmann. Bülowssiege 1991-1992
From the series: Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege 1991-1992 (installation view)
Colour photograph, archival pigment print
105 cm x 70cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Cityscapes, 1979-1985 (left) and Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 (right) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 (left) and Notations 1984-1986 (right) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Berlin, Pappelallee
September 1984
Aus der Serie: Notizen. 1984-1986
From the series: Notations. 1984-1986
B/w archival pigment print
14 x 21cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Notizen. 1984-1986
From the series: Notations. 1984-1986 (installation views)
B/w archival pigment print
14 x 21cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

“While I was still busy fine-tuning my technical skills for Cityscapes, over in West Germany very small automatic rangefinders were coming onto the market. That was in the early 1980s. […] I got hold of one of those and suddenly I could carry a camera with me all the time, take it anywhere, and I started using it like an “extended eye”. The little camera allowed me to take more intimate, more “personal” works. For me that meant talking about my own life. That was the beginning of the series Notations, as I later called it. I focused on my circle of friends and my immediate environment. And so the Notations came about and that was what I wanted to achieve, as a conscious antithesis to other series like the Cityscapes.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Red October 2018, from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Roter Oktober (Red October)
2018
Leporello with 45 b/w and colour photographs mounted on cardboard
14.8 × 21.0 × 2.0cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Michael Schmidt (German, 1945-2014)
Müller-Ecke Seestrasse, Berlin-Wedding (Berlin-Wedding)
1976-1978
© Michael Schmidt, Foundation for Photography and Media Art with the Michael Schmidt Archive

Tata Ronkholz (German, 1940-1997)
Dusseldorf, Sankt-Franziskusstraße 107
1977
Silver gelatin print on baryta paper
41.2 × 51.2cm
Courtesy The Photographische Sammlung / SK Stiftung Kultur, Cologne / Permanent Loan of the Sparkasse KölnBonn

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Roter Oktober (Red October) (installation views)
2018
Leporello with 45 b/w and colour photographs mounted on cardboard
14.8 × 21.0 × 2.0cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

“Photographers love to complain about the chaos they work in and how that prevents them from keeping tabs on what they do. At some point I realised that the concertinas were a fantastic tool for tracing and recoding the progress of my work. Above all, they enabled me to locate my negatives, because I used very simple but precise captions with the place and date of the picture. I always liked the versatility of the concertina. Now, whenever I need to find a negative, I take one of these booklets of the shelf and look for the photograph. They have become a means to communicate with myself about my work and I miss them when they are being exhibition and I haven’t got them at home.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, The Pomp of Power. 1983-1990, from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo by Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Die Pracht der Macht. 1983-1990
The Pomp of Power. 1983-1990
Leporello with 30 b/w photographs mounted on cardboard
14.8 × 21.0 × 1.5cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Die Pracht der Macht. 1983-1990
The Pomp of Power. 1983-1990 (installation views)
Concertina booklet with 30 b/w photographs mounted on cardboard
14.8 × 21.0 × 1.5cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Clarity and compositional elegance

It may also have been his professional disposition that led him to pay particular attention to the GDR city. After all, he was an expert. Wüst was an expert in the field of urban development; he knew exactly what he was photographing. In the midst of the “leaden times” of the GDR, an era shortly before the collapse in which hardly anything seemed to be moving. Mid-1970s to mid-1980s. Urban and housing construction has long since said goodbye to the promising ideals of a better, because socialist, promise. The reality was pragmatic and merciless. Dilapidated old building and decaying substance on one side and serial prefabricated building on the other.

Wüst’s pictures, which sometimes develop a peculiar irony in their clarity and compositional elegance, can also be understood as political statements. “They searched for clues in a way that was unusual in the GDR as a way of ascertaining the real perceived state of the present,” writes Flügge about the photographer, who knew exactly what he wanted to find and capture. Even the depiction of reality could be considered subversive in the workers’ and farmers’ state. It wasn’t appropriate to show things as they were. Rather, you should show things as they should be. …

By “limiting the image section, he forces reality to formulate its own,” summarizes Flügge.

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Village Edge. The Municipality of Nordwestuckermark, 2014-2019 from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Book of the Years. 1978-2008 (right) and Mitte. Berlin, 1994-1997 (left) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Schützenstraße / Jerusalemer Straße
1996
Aus der Serie: Mitte. Berlin 1995-1997
From the series: Mitte. Berlin 1995-1997
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

The different historical eras come together in his pictures. Relics from the pre-war period, often ruins, alongside the proud examples of Eastern Modernism from the post-war period, and finally the cheap and quickly built architecture of the present day. These photos are still important today, and not just for architectural historians and photography connoisseurs. Wüst’s pictures of the GDR city are visual findings about the condition of its residents, even if the people in them are absent. In his text, Flügge quotes from Alexander Mitscherlich’s book Die Unwirtlichkeit unserer Städte. Anstiftung zum Unfrieden (The inhospitability of our cities. Incitement to Discord), in which the doctor, psychoanalyst and writer examined the West German city as early as 1965: “This city shape is regressively shaping the character of its residents.” In his book, Mitscherlich hoped that the city would one day become a “biotope for free people”. It didn’t quite turn out that way, but in a certain sense Mitscherlich wasn’t entirely wrong either. The GDR would soon disappear and with it the GDR city.

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Mitte. Berlin 1995-1997
From the series: Mitte. Berlin 1995-1997 (installation views)
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

I am well aware of how ambivalent photography is. And just because photographs have a documentary air about them, I find it to some extent dubious to slap a documentary label on them. If, ten centimetres from the edge of my picture, the whole content is counteracted by something completely different, then I can no longer claim to be doing serious documentary work. Documentation as a form, in my view, is just a way to explore a theme – a means. I only want to photograph and not distort things. It’s true that there is a documentary background, but what I do with it is always something of my own and totally subjective.

Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Mitte. Berlin 1994-1997 (right) and Prenzlau, 2018 (left) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Prenzlau, 2018, from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Prenzlau
From the series: Prenzlau
2018
Colour photograph, archival pigment print
45 × 30cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Prenzlau
From the series: Prenzlau (installation views)
2018
Colour photograph, archival pigment print
45 × 30cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 (right) and Book of the Years. 1978-2008 (left), from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Kreta (Crete)
1997
Aus der Serie: Jahrebuch. 1978-2008
From the series: Book of the Years. 1978-2008
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Jahrebuch. 1978-2008
From the series: Book of the Years. 1978-2008 (installation views)
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
London
1951
Gelatin silver print

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Jahrebuch. 1978-2008
From the series: Book of the Years. 1978-2008 (installation view)
B/w archival pigment print
18 x 27cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

August Sander (German, 1876-1964)
Das Siebengebirge von der unteren Terrasse hin zur Löwenburg
The Siebengebirge from the lower terrace towards the Löwenburg castle
1922
Gelatin silver print
© Die Photographische Sammlung/SK Sitftung Kultur – August Sander Archiv, Köln; VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn, 2022

A collection/compilation. A great deal of chance and responding to mood. The urban excursions, by contrast, followed a strict pattern. There it was about the grey cityscapes, grey “Mitte” and grey “Morgenstraße”. And yet all of them were taken in bright sunlight! Without the weather forecast promising a safe sunny day, I would probably never have been brave enough to set out on wanderings that did not augur much solace.

Most of the pictures in the book of the Years, on the other hand, really were taken in grey weather. They were done over a period of thirty years, mostly without any particular intention, straight from the experience. Later I gathered them into a kind of melancholy section through times and places. The pictures say: I was here. And I was in this or that mood. They are mood! And sometimes they flirt with the mood as well. That can happen.

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Mitte. Berlin 1994-1997 (right), Village Edge. The Municipality of Nordwestuckermark, 2014-2019 (left) and Prentzlow. Prenzlau, 2018 (centre) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst’s photographic work captures his wanderings through German history, portraying the social and urban transformations from the GDR and its disintegration, through the German reunification to the present day. Wüst revives the German history in a new static way, where the past and present clash in a dynamic and ever-changing environment.

Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst shows a selection of nine suites taken between 1978 and 2019. Ulrich Wüst’s photographic work can be contemplated from different perspectives. While the observations captured here are rooted in Germany’s division and its mending, at the same time they always relate to universal phenomena of social change and its material manifestations. The seemingly terse images, extremely precise in their composition, are the fruits of lengthy visual wanderings through present sites of recent history.

Text from the RMIT Gallery website

Installation view, Ulrich Wüst, Wiegmann Legacy. Bülowssiege, 1991-1992 (left) and Village Edge. The Municipality of Nordwestuckermark, 2014-2019 (right) from the exhibition Wanderings About History. The Photography of Ulrich Wüst, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne, 2024
Photo: Christian Capurro

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Randlage. Die Gemeinde Nordwestuckermark 2014-2019
From the series: Village Edge. The Municipality of Nordwestuckermark 2014-2019 (installation view)
B/w archival pigment print
26 x 39cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Parmen
2016
Aus der Serie: Randlage. Die Gemeinde Nordwestuckermark 2014-2019
From the series: Village Edge. The Municipality of Nordwestuckermark 2014-2019
B/w archival pigment print
26 x 39cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa

“In the last few years I started taking pictures in the countryside again. The idea was to have photographs of villages and landscapes that were just as “dry” as my cityscape series, like Berlin, or Magdeburg. The resulting work is far removed from any sort of rural idyll, but equally as far removed from the affection I have from these landscapes. I chose not to give too much away.”

~ Ulrich Wüst, wall text from the exhibition

Ulrich Wüst (German, b. 1949)
Aus der Serie: Randlage. Die Gemeinde Nordwestuckermark 2014-2019
From the series: Village Edge. The Municipality of Nordwestuckermark 2014-2019 (installation views)
B/w archival pigment print
26 x 39cm
© Ulrich Wüst; ifa
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

RMIT Gallery
344 Swanston Street, Melbourne

Opening hours:
Tuesday to Friday 11am – 5pm
Saturday 12.30pm – 5pm

RMIT Gallery website

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Exhibition: ‘Robert Frank – Memories’ at the Fotostiftung Schweiz, Winterthur, Zürich

Exhibition dates: 12th September, 2020 – 10th January, 2021

Curator: Martin Gasser

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019) 'White Tower, New York' 1948 from the exhibition 'Robert Frank – Memories' at the Fotostiftung Schweiz, Winterthur, Zürich, Sept 2020 - Jan 2021

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
White Tower, New York
1948
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

An interesting selection of media images, including some early Swiss and American photographs, which are rarely seen.

Frank’s perceptiveness of human beings and their context of being and becoming is incredible. Look at the faces in Landsgemeinde, Hundwil (1949, below), Paris (1952, below) and the attitude of the bodies, surmounted by the sun (top left), in London (1951, below).

“It is important to see what is invisible to others.”

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Many thankx to Fotostiftung Schweiz for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

The recently deceased Robert Frank is widely regarded as one of the most important photographers of our time. His book The Americans, first published in Paris in 1958 and then in New York the following year, is quite possibly the most influential photo book of the 20th century. As a kind of photographic road movie, it sketches a gloomy social portrait that served as a wake-up call to all of America at the time. And his personal style, alternating between documentary and subjective expression, radically changed post-war photography. But The Americans wasn’t merely a spontaneous stroke of genius. Frank’s early works already feature back stories and side plots that are closely connected to the themes and images of his legendary book. The Fotostiftung Schweiz holds a collection of lesser-known works – many of which were donated by the artist – which illustrate the consolidation of Frank’s subjective style. In addition to essays from Switzerland and Europe, it also includes works from early 1950s America that are on par with the well-known classics, but remained unpublished for editorial reasons. At the heart of the exhibition Robert Frank – Memories is the narrative force of Frank’s visual language, which developed in opposition to all conventions and only received international recognition when Frank had already abandoned photography and turned to the medium of film.

The exhibition is accompanied by a presentation of the books that publisher Gerhard Steidl produced with Robert Frank over a period of more than 15 years.

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019) 'New York City' 1948 from the exhibition 'Robert Frank – Memories' at the Fotostiftung Schweiz, Winterthur, Zürich, Sept 2020 - Jan 2021

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
New York City
1948
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
Landsgemeinde, Hundwil
1949
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019) 'Landsgemeinde, Hundwil' 1949 (detail)

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
Landsgemeinde, Hundwil (detail)
1949
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
London
1951
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
Paris
1952
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
New York City
early 1950s
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank, who was born in Zurich in 1924 and died last year in Canada, is widely regarded as one of the most important photographers of our time. Over the course of decades, he has expanded the boundaries of photography and explored its narrative potential like no other. Robert Frank travelled thousands of miles between the American East and West Coasts in the mid-1950s, going through nearly 700 films in the process. A selection of 83 black-and-white images from this blend of diary, sombre social portrait and photographic road movie would leave its mark on generations of photographers to come. The photobook The Americans was first published in Paris, followed by the US in 1959 – with an introduction by Beat writer Jack Kerouac, no less. Off-kilter compositions, cut-off figures and blurred motion marked a new photographic style teetering between documentation and narration that would have a profound impact on postwar photography.

It is quite possibly the single most influential book in the history of photography; however, rather than being a spontaneous stroke of genius, Frank had worked on his subjective visual language for years. Many of his photographs from Switzerland, Europe and South America, as well as his rarely shown works from the USA in the early 1950s, are on a par with the famous classics from The Americans. The photographer’s early work, which remained unpublished for editorial reasons and is therefore little known to this day, reveals connections to those iconic pictures that still define our image of America, even today.

At the heart of the exhibition Robert Frank – Memories is the narrative force of Robert Frank’s visual language, which developed in opposition to all conventions and only received international recognition after Frank had already abandoned photography and turned to the medium of film. The exhibition mainly features vintage silver gelatin prints from the collection of the Fotostiftung Schweiz, which either come from the former collection of Robert Frank’s long-time friend Werner Zryd (now owned by the Swiss Confederation) or were donated to the Fotostiftung Schweiz by the artist himself. They are complemented by a number of loans from the Fotomuseum Winterthur. A presentation of the books and films that publisher Gerhard Steidl released with Robert Frank over a period of more than 15 years accompanies the exhibition (in the corridor leading to the library and in the seminar room).

Early Work

In March 1947, Robert Frank arrived in New York following an adventurous journey on a cargo ship. The young, ambitious photographer had found Switzerland too stifling and he hoped to gain new freedom in America liberated from social and family obligations. The photographer carried a 6×6 Rolleiflex and a small spiral-bound book of 40 photographs taken during his apprentice years from 1941 to 1946. This portfolio included landscapes, portraits, personal photojournalistic works, and meticulously executed still lifes, all of which reveal that the 22-year old was a highly skilled photographer. It is therefore unsurprising that influential Harper’s Bazaar art director Alexey Brodovitch swiftly hired Frank as an assistant photographer after seeing his portfolio and first test photos.

In the magazine’s in-house photo studio, Frank photographed fashion industry products from clinical shots of women’s shoes and every imaginable accessory to laboriously staged fashion shoots and occasionally even photojournalistic assignments offering a little more freedom. Frank was successful and rose through the ranks, but quickly realised that this industry cared only about money, an attitude to which he couldn’t reconcile himself. Only a few months later, he quit his job in order to be able to work wholly free of constraints. He traveled to Peru and Bolivia the following year and often used his 35 mm Leica. Later he recalled: “I was making a kind of diary. I was very free with the camera. I didn’t think of what would be the correct thing to do; I did what I felt good doing. I was like an action painter.”

Frank returned to Europe in spring 1949. He photographed the yearly cantonal assembly in the Swiss canton of Appenzell Ausserrhoden, during which citizens (exclusively men back then) voted by a show of hands. However, he was unsuccessful in placing this story with a major periodical, even though he circulated the images via the acclaimed agency Magnum. Evidently, Frank had focused too little on the actual events. He was more interested in the bystanders’ stances than in the pomp of government officials wearing tailcoats and top hats. His photographs of this assembly prefigure the penetrating and critical gaze he would later level on America’s societal and political landscape. Here as there, his was an outsider’s subjective and inward looking perspective.

Black White and Things

In late 1949, the international magazine Camera published a first selection of Robert Frank’s work. The accompanying text described him as a photographer who loved “truth and unvarnished reality”, as someone “whose thirst for experience compelled him to get out and capture life with his camera”. Indeed, Frank worked chiefly in Paris, London, and Spain between 1949 and 1953, frequently traveling between Europe and the US. He reported on a bullfighter in Spain and observed life in London’s financial district. In Paris he took pictures of objects – mostly chairs and flowers – photographs he assembled in an album dedicated to his future wife. In subsequent years, he shook off any sentimental tendencies.

Frank continued his attempts to publish both smaller and more substantial stories and photo essays in glossy magazines such as Life, but with limited success. His reportage on Welsh coal miner Ben James, which appeared in U.S. Camera 1955 annual, was a rare exception. But Frank found himself less and less able to reconcile himself with the conventional view of photography as a universal language accessible to all. Instead, he increasingly distanced himself from print media’s expectations and developed a strong aversion to what he once termed stereotypical “Life stories”, “those goddamned stories with a beginning and an end”.

In autumn 1952, Frank created Black White and Things with his Zurich-based friend Werner Zryd. This handmade book comprising 34 photographs was an attempt to counter these expectations with something new: an intuitively ordered series of photos with neither text nor linear narrative structure, introduced simply by Saint-Exupéry’s famed lines from The Little Prince: “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” Accordingly, Black White and Things is a kind of three-part visual poem: “Black” evokes death, materialism, loneliness, and anonymity; “White” evokes home, love, religion, and camaraderie; and “Things” engages with diametrical oppositions such as friendship and cruelty, and affection and solitude. The order and pairing of the images sparks thoughts, associations, and feelings. Yet Frank’s evocative arrangement is intentionally ambiguous and open: “Something must be left for the onlooker, he must have something to see. It is not all said for him.”

America, America

After a further trip to New York – which he assured his mother would be his last – Robert Frank applied for a Guggenheim fellowship in October 1954. His project proposal was for an “observation and record of what one naturalised American finds to see in the United States that signifies the kind of civilisation born here and spreading elsewhere”. The result was to be a book, for which he had already won support from Arnold Kübler, the long-standing editor of the Zurich-based culture magazine Du, and Robert Delpire, a young publisher in Paris. Thanks to help from Alexey Brodovitch, Walker Evans, Edward Steichen and others, Frank was the first European photographer to be awarded this generous fellowship. The award made it possible for him to set off on his now-legendary road trips across the US in spring 1955.

Over almost two years, Frank took more than 20,000 photographs on his travels. He made roughly 1,000 work prints in the autumn and winter of 1956-57, which he pinned to the walls and laid on the floor of his apartment. At the time his home was East Village, New York, where artists including Alfred Leslie and Willem de Kooning also lived. Over many months Frank made countless passes through his photographs, eliminating those images he was unsure of and focusing on specific themes. He constantly rearranged the selection that was gradually coming together until he had a first mocked-up book with just under 90 images and the provisional title America, America. Frank took this book with him when he traveled to Europe in summer 1957, showing it to Delpire and his Swiss photographer friend Gotthard Schuh.

Over the years, the America photographs not included in his final selection disappeared into archives and collections or even got lost altogether. Only recently has it been possible to ascertain that many of the rejected and unpublished photographs were of the same caliber as the 83 book images Frank and Delpire agreed on. Frank’s contact sheets show that these photos were often taken directly before or after the images that have become icons of photographic history. Rather than putting forth a single message, Frank’s dark take on 1950s America contains impressive variations, facets, and excursuses that made a powerful impression on many, including his early supporter, Schuh. Schuh wrote to his young friend: “I don’t know America, but your photographs frighten me because in them you show, with visionary alertness, things that affect us all.”

The Americans

Following the first French edition of Les Américains, Robert Frank’s book was published as The Americans in New York in 1959. The English edition dropped the cover illustration and the selection of texts on America (which Delpire had insisted on over Frank’s protests), and added an introduction by Jack Kerouac. Frank had much in common with the Beat poets, though he only met them after his Guggenheim-funded travels. Like Kerouac’s main character in On the Road, Frank crisscrossed the country with apparent aimlessness, working spontaneously. Moreover, his work shares a stylistic consonance with Beat literature: Frank had abandoned all technical conventions and photographed intuitively instead. Many of his photographs are underexposed and grainy; they frame a scene and omit key details; their horizons are slanting and the lighting is often murky. Frank’s focus was the everyday, the fleeting, and the marginal. People are shown turning away from the camera, and his landscapes are desolate and bleak, “really more like Russia”, as Frank once remarked to Kerouac. He flouted the rules he had learned during his early training as a photographer in Switzerland in order to be as true as possible to his subjective experience and to capture unvarnished reality.

Kerouac’s introduction begins with the words: “That crazy feeling in America when the sun is hot on the streets and music comes out of the jukeboxes or from a nearby funeral, that’s what Robert Frank has captured in tremendous photographs taken as he traveled on the road around practically forty-eight states in an old used car (on Guggenheim Fellowship) and with the agility, mystery, genius, sadness and strange secrecy of a shadow photographed scenes that have never been seen before on film …” The Americans is a long, poetic image arc with cross-references, digressions, and associations, but also mental leaps and ambiguities, which provoked many critics. Although most acknowledged that Frank’s photographs were highly powerful, they read his take on Americans as a malicious attack on the country. Frank, a Jewish foreigner, was resented for picking up on the racism, hollow patriotism, commodified cheer, and political corruption lurking behind the façade of American society. Even before his groundbreaking book was published, Robert Frank wrote: “Above all, I know that life for a photographer cannot be a matter of indifference. Opinion often consists of a kind of criticism. But criticism can come out of love. It is important to see what is invisible to others.”

Martin Gasser, Curator

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
“Los Angeles”
1955
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
City fathers – Hoboken, New Jersey
1955
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
Bus-Stop, Detroit
1955
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
Bar – Gallup, New Mexico
1955
Gelatin silver print
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss, 1924-2019)
Charity Ball – New York
1954
© Andrea Frank Foundation; courtesy Pace / MacGill Gallery, New York
Collection of the Swiss Photo Foundation

Müller + Hess, Wendelin Hess and Jesse Wyss, Basel / Zurich

Fotostiftung Schweiz
Grüzenstrasse 45
CH-8400 Winterthur (Zürich)
Phone: +41 52 234 10 30

Opening hours:
Tuesday – Sunday 11am – 6pm
Wednesday 11am – 8pm
Closed on Mondays

Fotostiftung Schweiz website

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European photographic research tour exhibition: ‘Robert Frank. Unseen’ at C/O Berlin

Exhibition dates: 13th September – 30th November, 2019
Visited September 2019 posted January 2020

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Utopian dreaming / dystopian dreams

Synchronicity… when I visited this exhibition on the 16th September 2019, the grand man had only died the previous week on the 9th September 2019.

This was a fabulous exhibition of mainly VINTAGE prints (see labels) at C/O Berlin, with the added bonus of seeing many Robert Frank photographs I had never seen before.

Thoughts

1/ The vintage prints were much larger than I had thought they would be

2/ The English photographs were very impressive. A similar tonal range to Josef Sudek’s prints in these works i.e. no hard blacks or whites zones 2.5-8

3/ The Americans – to actually see a large vintage print of the Trolley Car was incredible. The Black American man’s face was only his mouth, nose and eyes, the rest was completely dark

4/ The vintage prints seemed more whimsical than the later prints: not so much contrast. Sometimes edges bleed off, grain was large, depth of field low, skylines askew. Frank loved his silhouettes and chiaroscuro

It was a great pleasure to see these iconic photographs together in one place. Several times I had to catch my breath as one famous image followed another. But then there were images I had never seen before. Mostly vintage prints as well… as close to Frank’s original vision as you can get. More poetic, more spontaneous, than the later prints. The United States photographs form a road trip of impressions, a reflective and elegiac poem to the American dream.

It’s not often that you can say that an artist changed how we see and interpret the world but that is the case. Through his seminal work The Americans, Frank’s importance to the history of photography and visual culture cannot be denied. Americans didn’t like the mirror that was held up to their society by an outsider, a European Jew. Frank certainly wasn’t afraid to picture the underbelly of America – a phlegmatic portrait of a disaffected and divided country that still has great relevance today.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

All installation photographs © Marcus Bunyan. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

Installation view of the exhibition 'Robert Frank. Unseen' at C/O Berlin showing photographs titled 'Landsgemeinde / Cantonal Assembly Hundwil, Schweiz' (1949)

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing photographs titled Landsgemeinde / Cantonal Assembly Hundwil, Schweiz (1949). Later silver gelatin prints. No individual titles. Donation of the artist.
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Landsgemeinde / Cantonal Assembly Hundwil, Schweiz' 1949 (installation view) at the exhibition 'Robert Frank. Unseen' at C/O Berlin

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Landsgemeinde / Cantonal Assembly Hundwil, Schweiz (installation views)
1949
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Peru' 1948 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Peru (installation view)
1948
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur
Permanent loan of the Volkart Stiftung
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank. Unseen wall text
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Geneva' 1945 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Geneva (installation view)
1945
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Geneva' 1944-45 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Geneva (installation view)
1944-1945
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
New York
c. 1949
Vintage silver gelatin print
Donation of the artist

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Times Square, New York' 1949 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Times Square, New York (installation view)
1949
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank. Unseen wall text
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Portfolio. 40 Photos' 1941-46 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Portfolio. 40 Photos (installation views)
1941-1946
First Edition Steidl, Göttingen, 2000
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Mississippi, St Louis' 1948 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Mississippi, St Louis (installation view)
1948
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Paris' 1949 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Paris (installation view)
1949
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Paris (installation view)
1949
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Mary and Pablo, New York' 1951 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Mary and Pablo, New York (installation views)
1951
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (b. 1924 in Zurich, d. 2019 in Nova Scotia, Canada) traveled thousands of kilometres between America’s East and West coasts, taking almost 30,000 photographs. Just 83 black-and-white pictures from this mixture of diary, social portrait, and photographic road movie have influenced generations of photographers after him. Frank’s book The Americans was first published in Paris before it was released in the United States in 1959 with an introduction by the Beat novelist Jack Kerouac. Oblique angles, cropped figures, and blurred movement became the hallmarks of a new photographic style that would change the course of postwar photography. In 1985, Franks photographs have been displayed in Germany for the first time – in the Amerika Haus in Berlin. Now, C/O Berlin presents contact sheets, first editions, and vintage material from the photographer’s early work at the same place. His time in Switzerland, travels through Europe and South America, and unpublished pictures from the United States in the 1950s will be shown together with famous classic photos from The Americans.

Robert Frank. Unseen reveals the narrative power of a visual language that Frank developed long before it earned him international recognition.

The exhibition was organised in cooperation with the Fotostiftung Schweiz, Winterthur.

Robert Frank was born in Zurich in 1924. A trained photographer, he traveled to New York for the first time in 1947, where he found a position at the Harper’s Bazaar photo studio. He worked between Europe and the US for several years and in 1950, Edward Steichen invited him to participate in the 51 American Photographers exhibition at Museum of Modern Art, New York. Frank freelanced for Life, McCall’s, Look, Vogue and other magazines. In 1955, he was the first European to receive a prestigious Guggenheim fellowship that funded a comprehensive photo series for which he traveled across America. The result was the seminal photobook The Americans (1959). Following the volume’s unexpected success, the photographer turned to film. His later work juxtaposed Polaroids and autobiographical text fragments. This year Frank published his most recent book, Good Days Quiet, at the age of 95. Frank’s photographs have been exhibited internationally, most recently at Les Rencontres d’Arles (2018); Albertina, Vienna (2018); Art Institute of Chicago (2017); Museum Folkwang, Essen (2014); and at Tate Modern, London (2004). His films were shown at C/O Berlin in 2009. Robert Frank lived in New York and in Nova Scotia, Canada, where he died on September 9, 2019.

Text from the C/O Berlin [Online] Cited 28/12/2019

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at bottom, photographs of London
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'London' 1951 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
London (installation view)
1951
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Paris (installation view)
1949
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at right a photograph of London
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
London (installation view)
1951
Vintage gelatin silver print
Arnold Kübler Archive
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
London
1951
Vintage gelatin silver print
Arnold Kübler Archive

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
London (installation views)
1951
Gelatin silver photographs, later prints
Permanent loan of the Friends of the Fotostiftung Schweiz
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
London
1951
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Permanent loan of the Friends of the Fotostiftung Schweiz

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Paris
1952
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist

America

Robert Frank. Unseen wall text
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at left, Nevada (1956); at second left, Los Angeles (1956); and at right, On the road to Carolina (1955)
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019) 'Nevada' 1956 (installation view)

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
Nevada (installation view)
1956
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Los Angeles' 1956 (installation view)

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
Los Angeles (installation view)
1956
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'On the road to Carolina' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
On the road to Carolina (installation view)
1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Route US 91, leaving Blackfoot, Idaho' 1956 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Route US 91, leaving Blackfoot, Idaho (installation views)
1956
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'U.S. 91, leaving Blackfoot, Idaho' 1956

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Route US 91, leaving Blackfoot, Idaho
1956
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at left, Florida (1956); at third left, New York City (early 1950s); and at right, Ranch Market, Hollywood (1955-1956)
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'New York City' early 1950s (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
New York City (installation view)
early 1950s
Vintage gelatin silver photograph
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Florida' 1956 (installation view)

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
Florida (installation view)
1956
Gelatin silver print
Swiss Foundation for Photography Collection, Winterthur
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Florida' 1956

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
Florida
1956
Gelatin silver print
© Robert Frank
Courtesy Swiss Foundation for Photography Collection, Winterthur

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
New York City (installation view)
early 1950s
Vintage gelatin silver photograph
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at left, Bar – Gallup, New Mexico (1955) and at right, Rodeo – New York City (1954)
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Rodeo - New York City' 1954 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Rodeo – New York City (installation views)
1954
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Rodeo – New York City
1954
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at right, Charity Ball, New York 1954
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Charity Ball, New York' 1954 (installation view)

Robert Frank (American, 1924-2019)
Charity Ball, New York (installation views)
1954
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Charity Ball, New York
1954
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern

Installation view of the exhibition 'Robert Frank. Unseen' at C/O Berlin showing at left 'Bar – New York' (1955) followed by, 'Yom Kippur – East River, New York City' (1954)

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at left in the bottom photograph, Bar – New York (1955) followed by, Yom Kippur – East River, New York City (1954)
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Los Angeles' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Los Angeles (installation view)
1955
Vintage gelatin silver photograph
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Los Angeles
1955
Vintage gelatin silver photograph
Donation of the artist

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Wanamaker Fire, 10th Street East, New York' 1956 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Wanamaker Fire, 10th Street East, New York (installation view)
1956
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Bar - New York' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Bar – New York (installation view)
1955
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Bar, New York City' 1955-1956

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Bar – New York
1955
Gelatin silver photograph, later print
Donation of the artist

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Yom Kippur - East River, New York City' 1954 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Yom Kippur – East River, New York City (installation view)
1954
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'USA' 1950s (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
USA (installation view)
1950s
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Contact Sheet 62 / Factory, Detroit' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Contact Sheet 62 / Factory, Detroit (installation views)
1955
From The Americans. 81 Contact Sheets.
Yugensha, Tokyo/Motomura Kazuhiko, 2009
Private Collection
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Contact Sheet 31 / U.S. 91, Leaving Blackfoot, Idaho' 1956 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Contact Sheet 31 / U.S. 91, Leaving Blackfoot, Idaho (installation views)
1956
From The Americans. 81 Contact Sheets.
Yugensha, Tokyo/Motomura Kazuhiko, 2009
Private Collection
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Contact Sheet 18 / Trolley, New Orleans' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Contact Sheet 18 / Trolley, New Orleans (installation views)
1955
From The Americans. 81 Contact Sheets.
Yugensha, Tokyo/Motomura Kazuhiko, 2009
Private Collection
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing wall text
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Bryant Park, New York' around 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Bryant Park, New York (installation view)
around 1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) '42nd Street, New York' early 1950s (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
42nd Street, New York (installation view)
early 1950s
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) '41st Street and 7th Avenue' 1953 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
41st Street and 7th Avenue (installation view)
1953
Vintage gelatin silver print
Donation of the artist
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Les Américans' book cover (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Les Américans' pages (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Les Américans book cover and pages (installation views)
1958
Delpire. Paris

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Gli Americani book cover (installation view)
1959

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'The Americans' book cover (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'The Americans' pages (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
The Americans book cover and pages (installation views)
1959
Grove Press, New York

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Trolley - New Orleans' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Trolley – New Orleans (installation view)
1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Trolley – New Orleans
1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern

Installation view of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at left, 'Parade – Hoboken, New Jersey' (1955) and at right, 'City Fathers – Hoboken, New Jersey' (1955)

Installation views of the exhibition Robert Frank. Unseen at C/O Berlin showing at left, Parade – Hoboken, New Jersey (1955) and at right, City Fathers – Hoboken, New Jersey (1955)
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'Parade - Hoboken, New Jersey' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
Parade – Hoboken, New Jersey (installation view)
1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photo: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019) 'City Fathers - Hoboken, New Jersey' 1955 (installation view)

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
City Fathers – Hoboken, New Jersey (installation views)
1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern
Photos: Marcus Bunyan

Robert Frank (Swiss-American, 1924-2019)
City Fathers – Hoboken, New Jersey
1955
Vintage gelatin silver print
Property of the Confédération Suisse, Federal Office of Culture, Bern