Manfred Schneckenburger: Birds hang in the air and cry
Birds hang in the air and cry (photos)
Inaugural address by Manfred Schneckenburger
Ladies and gentlemen,
A melancholy day, a touching subjekt – and a precise production, entirely linked to the site, emerging from the site. One of the most precise that has been shown in this pavilion and about this pavilion.
Thomas Wrede is the photographer of the Wewerka Pavilion. For years he has been documenting in masterly fashion the works of other artist in and on this big glass showcase. He has walked around it any time of the day, in any kind of light. Time and again searching for the right, ideal shot. Sometimes he noticed a dead or wounded, distraught bird next to the panes. Nothing else. Until one day a white shadow in back light on the glass, a little trace of dust, tiny remains of grease, secretion, blood, feathers caught his eye. A transparently smeared, barely visible touch without shape or outline. He had to look very closely in order to realize that what was left here was a fraction of a second, the impact of a bird in flight. This observation gave rise to the 12 photos you see here which are much more than mere shots:
Exposing a moment, which at the time of photographing had long since passed, the quiet, unspectacular remnant of an abrupt, often fatal fright. It´s in the nature of photography to capture fractions of a second on film. The great early photographers of the 19th century saw in a photo, literally, an „imprint“ of nature. In spite of all his empathy with the everyday tragedy of an animal Wrede was fascinated by this tender variation on a myth of birth of photography. In his photos the decisive moment took place long bevore the access of the camera´s eye. The instantaneous, photographic factor – the „imprint“ – has thus been doubled, if you like: raised to a higher power. This is a medial precision that these photos harbour.
At the same time though an almost magical process begins, which is more than and surpasses the eightfold enlargement. Out of the fleeting, almost imperceptible trace dissolving into transparency emerges an image of a dangerous contact that gains a dismaying presence. I don´t know which kind of particular paper, grain, contrasts, means to make the light lighter and the dark darker Wrede, who refrained from chemographic manipulation, has used to achieved this. Neither do I know in which way he formally reconstructed the birds´ bodies, their movement, dynamics, buildup, twist. How a disembodied phantom suddenly becomes corporeal and still remains totally immaterial. How an oversized memory – tortured, ghostly, vulnerable and hurt – really appears as a glowing vision against a dark, cosmic ground.
Each photography is an unsentimental memento. A soundless cry, inscribed effectively as well as gently, almost tenderly, into the backround. Each photo has an expressivity of its own far beyond its documentary character. The nightly ground is not just a photographic necessity that makes the collision visible – it fills the deadly moment with weight, drama, aggravation, almost monumentality.
The staging pointedly enhances this effect. I must admit that when I was first confronted whith the projekt I had my doubts as to whether the look across the pavilion would create enough presence. Wether an installation that turns inwards instead of outwards meets the restriction that the pavilion can not be entered. Wouldn´t it be better after all if the photos looked outwards? Fortunately Wrede has realized his own clear concept. It´s not just that the birds are now circling in the room. The room now extends like a protective zone, preventing all obtrusiveness, hindering a direct touch by the spectator´s look. The terrible moment seems reconstructed and at the same time overcome in a strange way. How theatrical, even banal it would have been to get the birds in direct contact with the panes and kill them once more. Wrede even renounced his original idea, to acoustically dramatize the situation with birdcalls and noises of impact. The current presentation has a quite different quality of expression than the sensational fixation of an animal catastrophy. The big black boards frame the photography like the wings of a tryptich. Klaus Lankheit called the tryptich a „formula of emotionalism“ – we recognize an echo of this formula of emotionalism in the order of two wings around a central image. This order is being stabilized time and again throughout the sequence of the 12 photos. Is it going too far to vaguely associate the order of an altar? An epitaph for 12 dead birds resurrected in the picture? I already said that Wredes work reminds me of the early photographers´ dream of getting nature to present itself. Almost all of the pioneers from Niepce to Henry Fox Talbot held onto the idea of naturemimetic procedure. Niepce: „Nature itself leaves an imprint on the sheet“ – he suggested the term „physautopie“ which means self-imprint of the bodies. The sheet camera of the last century was supposed to record whatever would bet he result when a body leaves a direct impression: more than the eye can see. This strategie of imprint determined the photography of the 19th century as much as the strategies of enlargement determine the photography of our century In Thomas Wrede´s work both have been implemented essentially, both also artistically: the imprint as well as the enlargement that only makes the imprint readable. Once again the great Henry Fox Talbot in his book „The Pencil of Nature“ of 1844: „One of the charms of photography is the fact that a photographer, when examining his pictures, discovers things he cannot discern with his bare eyes.“ Wrede thus finds himself in the best tradition of photographic curiosity without using the camera´s eye in a voyeuristic way.
The remark that he therewith created a monument to 12 little birds may sound much too pompous or too sentimental. I nevertheless want to end with it.
Manfred Schneckenburger Muenster, November 27th, 1994
