PRESSRELEASE

Claus Goedicke– Scheibe Brot

February 5, 2010 – April, 17 2010

The History of Things

Who actually looks at them, the ordinary objects we handle every day—soap, scissors, hammer?

Even though there is a tendency today to make an aesthetic philosophy out of anything and

everything, and then package it in increasingly refined designs, never before have everyday

objects had a shorter lifespan, while the number of objects piling up around us has practically

never been so large as it is now.

For a long time, Claus Goedicke has been examining the nature of these things, their appearance,

our relationship to them, and our concept of them. He is interested in everything we use or

consume, from plastic bottles to vegetables. In his most recent series, begun in 2007, he has

turned to the basic elements of our daily lives, to all of the things we cannot do without, even

though—or perhaps because—we use them without actually thinking about them. They include

basic nutritional items, such as bread, butter, and eggs, as well as simple tools, from cutlery and

hammers to scissors. We have already seen the charm that can emanate from the latter, in Walker

Evans’ portfolio of photographs, produced in the mid-1950s, and about which he said, “. . . a

hardware store is a kind of offbeat museum show for the man who responds to good, clear

‘undesigned’ forms."

Yet, not only the tool, but the many other objects Goedicke uses in his works are also primarily

functional, and their forms are designed in ways that will best serve their functions. The objects in

Goedicke’s photographs take on a beauty and grace of their own, not least as a result of the

interplay between object and the surface beneath it. This as-yet unseen combination—of the

auratic thing and the familiar, yet not closely specified ground—shapes a cosmos in which the

imagination is free to roam. The things have a context, and yet they remain independent; the

photographs divest them of their concrete function. They become objects of observation and, as

such, their physical presence is as immediate as their figurative and symbolic qualities. Through

their minimalism and concentration, Goedicke’s photographs invite us to delve into the history of

each object.

-Maren Polte, 2010.

Claus Goedicke lives and works in Berlin.