josef chladek

on photobooks and books

Michael Schmidt - Natur, MACK, 2014, London

Clothbound hardcover.
In a series of black and white images of the German landscape made between 1987 and 1997, Michael Schmidt has forged a new pictorial language to deconstruct the world he observes. Concerned with light and form, Schmidt’s images contain a wealth of silver tones, a spectrum of rich greys which evolve from light to dark in mystical, imperceptible gradients. But the black and white filter is also a tool that allows Schmidt to neutralise the world, impeding the subjective perception of his viewer. It is through his editorial process, a process of montage, that Schmidt constructs an interior dialect, fashioning a self-contained world within the linear sequence of the book. (from the publisher)

"Natur easily references work done by other artists, and it contains echos of Schmidt’s earlier work (how could it not?). It also showcases some of the visual strategies Schmidt employed, which include repetition and/or just very slightly modified vantage points. But descriptions are hardly able to bring the experience of looking through the book any closer.
Instead, imagine sitting on a bench somewhere, and you hear a curious little and somewhat peculiar tune, a tune which after a while you can’t get out of your head any longer. You’re not quite sure why it appeals to you so much, but you don’t want it to stop." (Jörg M. Colberg)

Pages: 104
Place: London
Year: 2014
Publisher: MACK
Size: 18 x 24 cm (approx.)