Hartmann Books – förlag

Is driving thousands of kilometers by car with a camera through Los Angeles a dream or a nightmare? In his long-term project L.A. CROSSING, which has been in the making since 2010, Jens Liebchen shows us the capital of unconditional automotive mobility in the way that most Angelenos prefer to see it: through their car windows. There is no other city in which the maxim "I drive, therefore I am" has more validity than in L.A. The images, in which various elements of Liebchen’s rental cars are always visible, are a meditation on how urban space and a city’s lifestyle are shaped by dominant forms of mobility. Cars determine who belongs to society and who is allowed to move around freely. An icon of photographic art, Stephen Shore’s 'La Brea/Beverly' serves as a theoretical basis for Liebchen’s work. Beginning with the 'La Brea Matrix Project', which was centered around Shore’s photograph, Liebchen has reversed the common view and now looks back from the street to the city. Instead of stopping like Lee Friedlander (in 'America by Car') or following a strict gird like Ed Ruscha (in 'Every Building on the Sunset Strip'), Liebchen drives and drives and drives. From the privileged and air-conditioned perspective of the driver’s seat, he shows us the lights and shadows of the city of angels-the stuff of great cinema from the dream factory.

Turin Diary, February 10-February 16, 2020 February 10, 2020 "After a ten-hour delay due to Hurricane Sabine, I finally arrive in the old town of Turin. The weatherman on the radio this morning claimed that this storm was not the result of climate change, but quite normal for this time of year. Whatever: the air already smells and feels like spring, even though it is still chilly. The city of Fiat Lancia, Alfa Romeo, and Juventus Turin welcomes this German visitor with an Italian dinner and a cold beer."

London Diary, December 1-December 8, 2022 December 1, 2022 "It is has been nearly thirty years since I left the city after having lived here for almost a year. Today, the megalopolis presents itself very differently. The City, the financial and economic hub, is slowly but steadily turning into a kind of Singapore. And I keep thinking, oh yes, this is why they left the EU. They can hardly walk because of their strength. The tube stations spit out a workforce that makes just enough money to consume their takeaway lattes, followed by a Pret-A!Manger sandwich."

Kuching Diary, October 18 - October 26, 2023 October 18, 2023 "The Malaysian Meteorological Department issued a thunderstorm warning for Kuching and other areas in southern Sarawak this morning-and yes, the rain is pouring down. First observation apart from that: unlike I was told, the city is not that quiet. On the contrary, during rush hour hardly anybody walks. Instead, fourwheelers dominate the streets, and traffic lights are rare. Pedestrians, beware!"

Wilson Diary, March 9 -March 26, 2023 March 9, 2023 "I am staying in a warehouse, next to a local brewery run by a friendly giant who produces fifteen different types of beer, which are all served on tap. He does not miss the chance to give his babies names that are quite often as long as entire sentences: Fiesta, Fiesta Del Fuego or Eastern Carolina Honey Blonde. My favorite: Busy Gettin' Phizzy Citrus Hard Seltzer. Also tastewise. Oh, and the warehouse has been converted into apartments. It looks cool, but something went wrong: When the neighbors are talking on the phone, you can hear every word. And not just that."

Kathrin Linkersdorff's (*1966) fascinating large-format works resonate between art and science. Plants or bacteria comprise the visual reference point in her pictures, but it is not simply a matter of depicting them. Each image is a carefully selected, artistically staged image of the organic process of decay. The reference to Japanese wabi-sabi gives her works a dimension that transcends the visible. Wabi-sabi is a traditional aesthetic concept, according to which beauty implies the acceptance of imperfection, incompleteness, and transience. In addition to prior works from the previously unpublished Re-Naissance, Wabi-Sabi, Floriscences series, this book presents new pictures of her Fairies and the initial, very recent pictures from the Microverse series. For this body of work, still in its experimental phase, she is collaborating with Prof. Regine Hengge and the Institute of Microbiology at the Humboldt University Berlin.

With the twelve-part exposure #1 from 2000, for which she photographed herself running on a rooftop in Manhattan from twelve perspectives simultaneously, Barbara Probst began a long-term photo-artistic project that continues to this day. The latest two-part exposure #189 is an experiment with a completely unstaged situation in public space. In between, she has worked with diverse photographic themes, such as still life, street, nude, fashion, interior and portrait photography. In a constantly changing, accelerating, diversifying multimedial world, in which the call for media competence is becoming ever louder, her pictures and series sharpen the viewer's awareness that there are many perspectives, realities and points of view - in this respect they could hardly be more contemporary and relevant.The three authors of the publication discuss the topicality and impact of the themes addressed by her pictures. The book is published to accompany a major retrospective (Lucerne, Hanover, Cincinnati) and contains, for the first time, a catalog raisonné of all 189 exposures produced to date, as well as an overview of the works of recent years and installation views of her most important past exhibitions.