Ferien [Holidays]
Photo series | 2014
Funded by the Kreativfonds
Charlene Hahne’s working method springs from the moment when photography and painting engage in dialogue. In terms of content, her series »Ferien« [Holidays] deals with memory and passing, with the presence and absence of human traces in »spaces in nature«. The original intention of documenting human behaviour during the holidays developed into the desire to retreat and ask what people are actually doing there, and what traces of them remain when they are no longer there. The photos depict windbreaker tents, children’s toys, privacy screens and other utensils – evidence of their appropriation of the landscape. The only thing missing are the people. In their place, we discover coloured fields and new inventions which we’ve only encountered before in paintings.
Sven Kroner, guest researcher at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar and supervisor of Hahne’s work, explains that »the abandoned beach chairs, tents and sunbrellas are reminiscent of paintings by Hard Edge and Colourfield. But the interplay between painting and photography is not only masterfully done, there’s something ominous about the absence of people.«