Vom Reiz der Peripherie

Photography knows how to show things that we would not see without it. This touches us especially in photographic works that are dedicated to what is actually familiar: the periphery, prefabricated buildings, cities in the Ruhr region, structurally weak rural areas, everyday life in Germany, as seen by documentary photographers who had experienced the world war as children. With an excursus on the blind in photography, Andrea Gnam shows, chapter by chapter, the importance of architecturally designed or neglected spaces in our lives, how they determine our memories, and the important role that photography plays here.

Andrea Gnam, born 1959, publishes in print media and radio on art, architecture, photography, and literature, and since 2012 has maintained the first German-language blog with reviews, reflections, and lectures on photography. Private lecturer in German literature at the Humboldt University in Berlin. She has taught on media aesthetics and media theory at the University of Vienna for the past ten years. 2008 appointment to the German Photographic Academy.