Stefanie Schneider
Seeside (Zuma Beach)
2004

Name: Seeside (Zuma Beach)
Brand: Stefanie Schneider
Price: 450 USD
Availability: InStock

About the Item

Seeside (Zuma Beach) - 2004 29x28cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inventory #20430. Not mounted. The Tooth of Time It is obvious that the photographer Stefanie Schneider has a background in film. All her pictures live from the dust-filled eroticism of American road movies. For Hitchhikers, the thirty-seven-year-old artist sent her protagonists into the desert. The air shimmers. Desert. A highway, massive autos, dusty kisses. One is familiar with these sorts of images from films, even if one hasn't yet seen this particular one. In any case, it seems to be older: The tooth of time has gnawed at the photos; they are discolored, strangely and incorrectly exposed, covered with white spots. False! The photographic series Hitchhikers was created this year; the photos got their patina because the photographer Stefanie Schneider only uses film which has passed its expiration date by up to five years, and which accordingly reacts to light in unpredictable ways. Where one's assumptions are correct is in the matter of the cinematic allusions: Schneider received a degree in film at the Folkwang-Hochschule in Essen. In the USA, she was responsible for the scene photos in the feature-film debut (Everything put together) of Marc Forster (Monster's Ball, Finding Neverland) and out of that collaboration developed her own photographic series Suburbia. Hitchhikers is similarly structured and actually consists of stills, in this case without the accompanying film: loosely staged pictures in which the protagonists have space for spontaneous improvisations. No plot, but moods which seem familiar to us. Photographer Stefanie Schneider splits her time between Los Angeles, where she shoots her photographs, and Berlin, where she develops and enlarges her prints. Her interests in photography are in the physical nature of film, especially the process of its deterioration and the framing mechanism of images arranged on a reel. Often using expired Polaroid instant film, she photographs individuals in trailer parks and different plane settings in Southern California. The combined marks of degraded chemicals and an apocalypse-like setting give Schneider’s photographs an evocative and unmistakable sense of style. Schneider also works on feature films, and has designed album covers for popular musicians, including Cyndi Lauper and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Her work has been exhibited throughout Europe, including at the Braunschweig Museum für Photographie and at Les Rencontres d’Arles in France. When did you know you wanted to be an artist? It happened by chance. Right after my studies in film and photography, my initial plan was to move to Los Angeles to work in film editing. Coincidences lead me to a shop selling a box of expired Polaroid films, and without even having a camera, I bought them all. The next day I bought a camera, and went down to the beach with my sister to take some photographs. One thing led to the next, my work started to be exhibited, recognized, and sold. It all happened so fast and now, in hindsight, I think it was inevitable. Falk Schreiber, u-magazine, January 2006, issue 2, p.82-87

Creator:

Stefanie Schneider (1968, German)

Creation Year:

2004

Dimensions:

Height: 11.42 in (29 cm)Width: 11.03 in (28 cm)Depth: 0.04 in (1 mm)

Medium:

Metal,Archival Paper,Photographic Paper,C Print,Polaroid

Movement & Style:

Contemporary

Period:

2000-2009