BROHM, Joachim - Areal. A Photographic Project 1992-2002

Background information

"From 1992 to 2002 at the edge of a major German city, German photographer Joachim BROHM documented the transformation of an industrial zone characterized by unplanned growth into a modern and futuristic residential and business park. With the patience of a botanist and the curiosity of a cat, he dedicated himself to this area of backyards, enclosures, piles of materials and, later, to the deserted grounds, the geometrically laid-out streets and the rising new constructions. During his long-term project he worked meticulously to capture the changes made in the urban structures. His area is a sober everyday world marked by a huge number of trivialities. The photographs' finely balanced composition give evidence of the ambiguity in the seemingly familiar and the permanent flow of reality." (© Steidl Verlag, 2002)
"'Areal' is a project about a project. First there's the urban renewal project centering on a square block in Munich, Germany. Then there's the ten-year documentary project about this same area conducted by german photographer Joachim BROHM.
In some ways, out-of-print photo volume 'Areal', is about change-from an industrial site to a housing complex, but, in some ways it's about how things remain the same. The stained concrete, the triangle sign, the gas staton in winter and spring, the vw stationwagon are present in the first and last pages of the book (arranged chronologically). Think of it as a document of transition in which the world never quite transforms but hovers somewhere in the present, always in the act of becoming, always one thing and another. There's no endpoint here, just middle as far as the eye can see. Cars and trees and girders and girls, all in transition, always in transition.

Content

Like the project itself, the method of depiction by Joachim BROHM remains transitory and elusive. Unlike the romanticized and commodified landscape of Andreas GURSKY or the close-up, blurred everyday of Wolfgang TILLMANS, he never relies on a single visual vocabulary or gesture. Instead, he breaks down the commonplace into the visual qualities that characterize it: rapturous complexity, unexpected beauty, random color, overlapping styles, omnipresent and always broken grids, and the near miraculous power of the most deadpan human interactions.
The result doesn't feel like the story of a singular place or of a singular perception; instead it feels like the story of someone paying attention--like the project itself, an extended look into a transient perceptual intelligence. That intelligence isn't about codifying and thus finishing something: it's about the endless wanderings of human curiosity: Noticing one thing and then noticing another and then noticing something new about what you noticed before. There are no rules undrlying Areal, only observations; no final message, only the next message in a dynamic perceptual middle. That's the secret of paying attention. It's also the prize." (© Vince Leo, 2002)

About German photographer, Joachim BROHM (b. 1955)

Photo books by as well as with works by Joachim BROHM