Candida Hofer, Deutsche Bucherei Leipzig IX, 1997After looking at the image, read the following synopsis about the artist. If you were to take Hofer's approach to photography, what would you shoot?
I photograph in public and semi-public spaces that date from various epochs. These are spaces available to everyone. They are places where you can meet and communicate, where you can share or receive knowledge, where you can relax and recover. — Candida Höfer
Candida Höfer’s photographs reveal her interest in documenting collections of like things. Over the past twenty years, Höfer has created a systematic visual study of details within public spaces such as zoos, the interiors of office buildings, theaters, museums, and library reading rooms. Höfer’s straightforward and detached style at first seems clinical and purely documentary. Since the early 1980s people have been noticeably absent from Hofer’s photographs. Instead, she uses her camera to note repeated forms within public spaces such as furniture, lighting fixtures, ceiling or floor tiles, chairs, and tables, creating patterns and a sense of orderliness. Höfer also often emphasizes the ironic by drawing the viewer’s attention to things out of place. In Deutsche Bucherei Leipzig IX, the presence of people is strongly implied by the empty desks and lights, as well as by the books at the end of the room, evoking a sense of their purpose as vehicles of collected human history and knowledge.
Born in 1944 and raised in Eberswalde, Germany, Höfer currently lives and works in Cologne. Her works have been widely exhibited internationally: in Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Denmark, Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, and the United States. In addition, her photographs are held in private and public collections worldwide, including those at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among many others.
4 comments:
For some reason, taking a picture of the average food place in a zoo popped in my mind. I think of Brookfield zoo and how there are always people crammed in the little consession area, waiting in line for their cold beverages. I would take a birds-eye view of the interior of that building.
Stephanie Latendresse
period 5
3-4
12-24-08
I personally would take pictures of bookshelves in the library, just group of things. Such as concerts, zoo animals, fish in ponds, ants, etc. i would just find things that group themseleves nicely, and take pictures of it.
Ryan Hamlin
Period 1
3/15/09
I think I would shoot trees, like at an orchard, rows of books in a library, and lines of people at an amusement park.
Well what came to my mind was shooting in a train station. i think it would be a great place because peole use them everyday. When they grab the train on their way home from work and they relax for those couple of minutes they get from their tireing day
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