Photographer Thomas Struth: “My work is about the theatre of life.” | Louisiana Channel
We met great German photographer Thomas Struth for an in-depth conversation about his works, career and view on life.
“You have to have a reason. That’s the starting point. It has to come from within. You cannot calculate art. I mean, you can. But then it will not survive.”
Struth started as a painter and studied at the famous Düsseldorf Academy under Gerhard Richter.
“Artists work independently. From when I was 13 years old, I could not imagine working in an environment where somebody else would tell me what to do. I wanted to make my own decisions.”
Already as a student, Struth discovered his interest in photography and switched departments to study under Hilla and Bernd Becher.
“I pointed my camera at things that were covered and could not be seen clearly. Showing something others don’t see is a principal idea of art.”
An early scholarship brought Struth to New York, where he photographed his famous empty street pictures and sold his first works ever. Here, he also became aware of the enormous difference in attitude between post-war Germany and the United States:
“In New York, I experienced generous, liberal behaviour of people. In Düsseldorf, people often came up to me and asked: ‘Who gave you permission to do this? Who gave you permission to set the camera here?’ Just normal citizens. Whereas people in New York would come up to me asking what I was doing, and when I told them, they would say: ‘This is fantastic.’ It was a very rewarding time.”
Ever since, Struth has travelled the world and devoted himself to numerous projects - from family portraits over the series of museum pictures to images of more technical surroundings in recent years, just to mention a few.
“For a particular moment, I can devote myself to what I look at. I can become like a chameleon and become this place. In that respect, photography has the ability to bring places together that are not even close to each other. You talk about the other existence, the other mentality, the other time, the other people, the other identity that is not mine.”
“Now, I am very much under the impression of what has been going on politically during the last few years. It was very intentional that during the Trump years, I wanted to show the dead animals photographs for the first time in New York. Because I felt it was important to remind people that we all have to die. Also the bad people will die. It will not last forever.”
Summing up his long career and devotion to the power of images, Struth concludes:
“Pictures can be like batteries. All the love, devotion, and intuition that went into the picture is like a battery. And when you look at it, it gives you energy. The energy jumps over and becomes nourishing.”
Thomas Struth was born in 1954 in Geldern, Germany and studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. He was part of the first generation of artists to study photography with Bernd and Hilla Becher. Comprehensive solo exhibitions of Struth’s work have been presented at institutions including the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, The Tokyo National Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Museo del Prado in Madrid, the Museum Folkwang in Essen and Haus der Kunst in Munich. Between 1993-1996 Struth was the first Professor of Photography at the Staatliche Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe. Struth was awarded the Spectrum International Prize for Photography by Kulturstiftung Lower Saxony. He is an Honorary Fellow of The Royal Photographic Society and a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Struth’s work is featured in various public art collections, including Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, the Tate Gallery, London, the Galleria d’Accademia, Florence, the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. The artist lives in Berlin.
Thomas Struth was interviewed by Marc-Christoph Wagner in November 2022. The interview took place in Struth’s studio in Berlin, Germany.
Camera: Simon Weyhe
Edited by: Helle Pagter
Produced by: Marc-Christoph Wagner
Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2023
Louisiana Channel is supported by Den A.P. Møllerske Støttefond, Ny Carlsbergfondet and C.L. Davids Fond og Samling.
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Пікірлер: 29
*Watch Thomas Struth talk about how culture defends the freedom of the mind right here:* kzread.info/dash/bejne/ep-Tp9Jyj5jSh8Y.html
This channel is amazing. Thank you, Louisiana Channel.
He's so relaxing and clear
Amazing photographer. Love his work !!
Love his work.
i just love UNCONSCIOUS PLACES book. Thank you, Louisiana!
🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼♥
❤
@olafsager6056
Жыл бұрын
He looks like: Frédéric Schwilden, welt, Das neue Leben des Daniel Kaiser-Küblböck At 3:53
The Empire Roller disco was on Empire Avenue in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. P.S. in 1970s New York had an influx of Caucasian thugs who liked to threaten other Caucasian visitors from other countries that were trying to excel in there endeavors.
@stanleygreenberg66
7 ай бұрын
You mean Empire Boulevard, of course.
You should put the artist name in the thumbnail or in the first five words of the title because the thumbnail and title that tapers off without naming the artist is vague and doesn't make me want to click on this. If it said Struth I would have clicked immediately. Something to think about.
@dustyoldhat
Жыл бұрын
Photographer Thomas Struth | "My work is about the theatre of life.” | Louisiana Channel something like that
@dustyoldhat
Жыл бұрын
I only clicked on the video to see who the photographer was and let you know this opinion. Normally I would have just blown past this
@BardSonic
Жыл бұрын
Anything from this channel is worth clicking on...
@dustyoldhat
Жыл бұрын
@@BardSonic I agree, but that's not the point. I don't have time to watch every video, and when a video comes up as just a thumb and title, it would be great to see who the subject is. This is like completely normal SEO stuff that shouldn't be ignored tbh.
@dustyoldhat
Жыл бұрын
@@mamumonkan great. Also missing the point. For every person like you there’s dozens of people who would like to see the artists name being covered
THE BOOK OF PHOTOGRAPHY Thomas Struth regards photography as a means of keeping things from dying. Is this true? It's a lie, you'll never die. Let me explain: taking a picture is like taking a bite or eating a meal, it satisfies your urges, soothes, stills your hunger, even changes reality - but you will see after a while your hunger is still there again. After you throw the stone, the water surface is smooth again And that's it. Each photograph is a still life doomed to remain in an unchanging form, while art is one of the most vivid and fluid things we can touch. Why didn't the locals, the natives wanted to be photographed? And of course they were right, why would I SHOOT you, taking you as a motive. Why would I take something out of its natural environment and put it into some kind of parallel universe? A photo is not even an alternative fact, it does not smell natural. In a splitsecond we split something off from life. This remnant, bound like a book, only can starve in a prison. Now framed, an archive is your friend not life. καλημέρα Κάμερα καληνύχτα διορατικότητα
@user-ji2xb1zc5g
Жыл бұрын
Then what about video? It moves, it has a flow. It looks natural. But it still is sum of the split seconds. Also what about printed photography? Prints are tangible. And ultimately what about the series of photographs? It has a narrative. Also poetic. It sounds like you are talking about just a single photocopy.
@olafsager6056
Жыл бұрын
@@user-ji2xb1zc5g You're arguing on a good level. No, I am talking about the genre. A car photo is useless (not: meaningless or senseless), you can't sit in it, can't travel, can't ride, but this less can open new lessons to us. In order to reality however it is not plus, it is minus. It's not poetic, it is some kind of vanishing. ποίησις is creation - photo is reducing, perhaps a step to abstraction. It's true: series get a narrative, but not seriously (as serous or serum is just about approximately 55 % of the lifestream). At least we are in the plus, but I am afraid the overage comes from the aggregate, the total of pictures. The blend makes here your story. Every single photography is similar to zen. It was a car before and a car afterwards. In between there is light. Printing a photography (photós ‚light‘ und γράφειν graphein = „draw with light“) is only awarding but can draw us into light by using contrast. Video is only a game. Sorry, I am not that young, here I prefer the opinion of Salvador Dalí who said that filmmaking isn't art because there are too many creatives working on it. All videos are moving, but will also move you with their movement.
what's that camera he's using? thanks
@creatingaphotographer3187
Жыл бұрын
Some sort of large format body from linhof. Phase one IQ4 back I think
@billm7453
Жыл бұрын
Alpha technical body. Probably with a Rodenstock lens.
🥱
OK…… maybe this would make some sense if he would speak in his native language.