IF WALLS COULD TALK
The photo series Versiegelte Räume (Sealed Rooms) by Grit Dörre and Petra Steiner has literary traits. The East German facades captured by the two artists between 1991 and 1995 include both stores fronts and apartments that are full of memories. On the exteriors, time has equalized everything: the wood, glass, and stone reveal their original colors through a layer of gray – the patina of the GDR superimposed by the uncertainty of a time of change after reunification. Dörre and Steiner’s finely nuanced colors captivate the viewer as they emerge from the consistent and shadowless light. Everything is treated equally, and each detail has the space and time to have full effect.
Just as the novels of Marcel Proust (1871–1922, for example Rememberance of Things Past) stylistically live on through their conscious repetition and exact descriptions, the series Sealed Rooms develops its effect through its stringent and pure documentary approach to the facades. Our gaze pauses on the structures of walls and boards, pushes its way into the spaces of memory behind the dilapidated walls. This space’s meaning varies according to the viewer’s own personal experiences. Those who lived through the time before and during the formation of East Germany experience the facades differently as a foreign observer.
The exact selection of subjects and the plan for the project’s execution emerged exactly from such discussions and friction between the two photographers, as Dörre comes from Dresden while Steiner, now a Berlin resident, grew up and studied photography in Austria. Their engagement with the difficult subject prompts us to take up the search for the memories nearly lost forever in a rapidly changing Germany.
Horst Kloever
GRIT DÖRRE | |
| 1971 | born in Dresden, Germany |
| 1992-1995 | Apprenticeship in the handcraft of photography, Dresden and Potsdam, Germany |
| 1995 | Named “European Architectural Photographer of the Year 1995” |
| 1998 | Fellow for Photo and Graphic Design at Grey Advertising, New York, USA |
| Assistant to Steve Hellerstein Photography, New York, USA | |
| 2003-2008 | Degree in art history, Philosophy Department, TU Dresden, Germany |
| since 2004 | Independent freelance photographer |
| |
PETRA STEINER | |
| 1967 | born in Saalfelden, Austria |
| 1987-1989 | Photography studies at the "Grafische" in Vienna, Austria |
| 1989 | First prize, Austrian Photography Prize/Kees Foundation |
| 1990 | Internship in architectural photography, Kassel, Germany |
| since 1991 | Independent freelance architectural photographer, Dresden, Germany |
| 1994-1997 | Teaching position in photography at the HTW-Dresden/Department of Design |
| 1995 | Named European Architectural Photographer |
| since 1999 | lives in Berlin, Germany |
Exhibits (Selection)
| DÖRRE STEINER | |
| 2007-2008 | Voyages d’hiver, Allemagne et photographie contemporaine, Cambrai, France |
| 2004-2006 | Schlossallee Moritzburg, Germany |
| 2002 | Kinetische Räume, Galerie Oran, Dresden, Germany |
| 1998 | espace scellé, mois off, Paris, France |
| PETRA STEINER | |
| 2003 | Kinetische Räume, Galerie Oran, Dresden, Germany |
| 2002 | Michaelisquartier, Steidle und Partner, Junius-Verlag Hamburg, Germany |
| 2001 | est erat, focus berlin, Stuttgart, Germany |
| 2000 | Architektur 20. Jahrhundert, DAM, Frankfurt, Germany |
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