Interview in ART magazine

ART magazine has just published an interview with me about my work, as part of Akt Now – a portfolio presentation of international photographers, whose work deals with nudity, sex and the human body.

You can read the interview HERE.



The interview is in German, so here's a translation for English speakers...

1. What excites you about the subject of the nude?
I've always been fascinated by how such a common form can express a wide range of human emotions, meanings and messages. I am continuously inspired to explore the body in relation to a given surrounding context, in relation to its 'wearer'. It is an object in its materiality and simultaneously a subject imbued with desires and affectations. Which each body comes a whole new sea of a meaning, so there's never enough that can be brought to light.

2. How far would you go? Are there taboos?
I don't have any particular taboos or imposed restrictions. Since I work closely with my subject, it all depends on how they are inclined in terms of their own body representation. My intention is not to shock or cause a controversy with my work, and I'm not particular interested in the subjects that might be referred to as general taboos. I go as far or as close as is offered by the working collaboration, and this usually brings about a more natural portrayal and reflection of the body itself.

3. When is a nude picture an artwork?
This comes back to the universal question of "When is art art?". I consider the term 'nude' as just a visual categorization of a particular given artwork, just as it could be classified as a 'portrait", a 'landscape', 'documentary' or 'still-life'. So, in my opinion, the question relating to a nude as art or not isn't really valid from the start. It all relates to a much broader ongoing debate about the question of art in a postmodern world.

4. Do you have some inspiring examples/photographers/artists?
My tastes and likes vary immensely with every exhibition I go to, or new work I encounter, but the artists I tend to gravitate towards the most are George Bataille in his writings, Roger Ballen in his haunting photographic compositions, Hans Bellmer in his drawings... They offer a rawness that appeals to the 'abject' in me, and i always feel this tingling excitement when I revisit them!

5. With which other subjects you art is dealing as well?
The themes I work in all intertwine in one way or other, and mostly deal with the body as a primary working tool, exploring the clash of the private and the public, identity in self-representation, displacement, passions and death. Although I work mostly with photography, I usually let the message dictate the final medium and visual outcome, so projects have in the past also taken the form of video, text, installation and sculpture.