Gerhard Klocker
Unsweetened - Limited edition book, 1994
In the spirit of sitting silent, I am ending a long dry period of non-posting by picking up something off of my shelf which has quite possibly not seen daylight for 10 years. Not because it doesn't deserve it, but because, well, it just happens when the shelves get full, collecting becomes a drug, you end up with more books than you could possibly ever look at and of course its the newest which gets all of the attention.
It is my copy, signed to me by Gerhard Klocker in 1996, and I remember our meeting. What made it interesting to pull the book off the shelf this afternoon is that I don't remember a word he said about the book at the time and there is no text in the book, so, thanks to the distance, I get to re-discover it.
Made between 1990 and 1993, these aren't necessarily easy-listening as far as images go. Everything uncomfortable; bondage, roadkill, clostrophobia, blood, human waste, its all in there. The b/w high contrast style somehow stylizes everything to the edge of design and some of them are really beautiful, but most remain irritating; albeit beautifully irritating; unsweetened. A very loose and poetic combination of architecture, cityscapes, flowers, still-lives and amusement parks, each rough around the edges and deteroirating.
..like in Vanita stillifes of the past centuries, our eye rests on the things
- excrement, water, lightning and sex, analogously displayed -
which the photographer Klocker bestowes with a beauty never seen before.
Peter Weiermair
60 pages, 43 b/w images. Soft-bound.
You may be able to get them directly from Gerhard.
Ring me again Gerhard if you are in town again, its been a long time....
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