Space & Photography

The notion of space has changed over time, in particular its representation in media. In the exhibition Space & Photography, the Museum der Moderne Salzburg presents a survey of these shifts. Considering exemplary works by artists for a comparative study of the different photographic visions of space the exhibition is engaging in both a historical and global perspective.

Stereoscopic vision and conceptions of spatial dimensions, their extension and transformation are fundamentally at odds with the two-dimensional technically recorded image. Since the dawn of photography, this very incompatibility has prompted photographers to grapple with the question of how to represent space. The pioneering exhibition Space & Photography at the Museum der Moderne Salzburg surveys the history of this engagement with a selection of works by 35 artists from 14 countries spanning the period from 1860 to the present. The exhibition’s thematic spectrum ranges from works by Wolfgang Tillmans and others that examine architectonic and virtual spaces, to photographs addressing social, economic, and conceptual questions, as in the work of Santu Mofokeng. The photographic exhibits range from a walk-in camera obscura in which the lights of Salzburg’s old town limn a projected image to Hito Steyerl’s installation How Not to Be Seen (2013), which lets visitors somehow escape the encroachments of surveillance in public spaces and become invisible.

Space & Photography is divided into six thematic chapters. It opens with early imaging processes and experimental photography as the medium’s archetypical form. The second chapter traces the technological innovations of the 19th century, which propelled the emergence of new methods and capacities of the camera to imitate human ways of seeing and stereoscopy. In the early 20th century, the development of modern camera technologies led to the genesis of the “Neues Sehen” or “New Vision”; in conjunction with the ideas of the “Neues Bauen” or “New Architecture,” it gave rise to a novel perspective on architectonic space, the subject of another thematic focus. Exponents of the New Objectivity such as the photographer and Bauhaus teacher László Moholy-Nagy translated this shift into experimental conceptions of the photographic image that expanded the spectrum of visual impressions. The next chapters examine the photographic rendition of built space and architecture’s influence on society. Works by the conceptual artist Stephen Willats and the photographer Wolfgang Tillmans as well as the sculptor Isa Genzken address the expansion of the cities, suburbanization, and the rise of residential tower blocks. Tillmans’s video installation Book for Architects, which was presented at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale, attests to his fascination with life in the city as a kaleidoscope of widely divergent individual design decisions. With Allan Sekula and Noël Burch’s film The Forgotten Space (2010) and Dayanita Singh’s Museum of Chance (2015), the exhibition’s final section illuminates boundaries in political systems, economic spheres, and those spaces whose existence is primarily virtual.

With works by Philip Kwame Apagya, Herbert Bayer, Giacomo Brogi, Franz Burgmüller, Jindřich Eckert, Hans-Peter Feldmann, Seiichi Furuya, Isa Genzken, Johannes Gramm, Birgit Graschopf, Florence Henri, M. Hoffmann, Kenneth Josephson, Wolfgang Kudrnofsky, Georges Lévy & Moyse Léon (Léon & Lévy), Werner Mantz, Ingrid Martens, Santu Mofokeng, László Moholy-Nagy, Negretti & Sambra (Crystal Palace Company), Joseph W. Sambra, Beaumont Newhall, Gregor Sailer, Alfons Schilling, Allan Sekula / Noël Burch, Dayanita Singh, Margherita Spiluttini, Hito Steyerl, Sasha Stone, Clare Strand, Yutaka Takanashi, Wolfgang Tillmans, Umbo, Felix Weber, Stephen Willats

Organized by the Museum der Moderne Salzburg
Director: Sabine Breitwieser
Curator: Christiane Kuhlmann, Curator of Photography and Media Art
Curatorial Assistants: Peter Schreiner and Tina Teufel

Also on view:

Georg Eisler. World-View
November 18, 2017–April 8, 2018
Rupertinum [1] & [2]
The Museum der Moderne Salzburg mounts a major exhibition of the art of the painter Georg Eisler at the Rupertinum. With works from a generous donated ensemble, complemented by selections from the museum's existing holdings of works by the artist.