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Andreas Kretzschmar
ARTIST STATEMENT
"I have been a passionate photographer for many years. I am interested in languages and cultures, as well as culture and art. I take photos in black & white and colour, but mainly in black & white. The beauty and the interesting things are often hidden in the details or you only discover them at second glance."
READ THE INTERVIEW
What initially inspired your passion for photography, and how has your work evolved over the years?
Even as a child, I was fascinated by how photos preserve a small moment for eternity. As a teenager, I was given a black and white instant camera as a present. That's when I discovered my passion for black and white photography. Due to the lack of colour, I concentrated more on the statement, contrasts and shapes as a viewer. In addition, black and white photographs radiate a certain calmness for me, which is still the case today.
However, I later also photographed in colour with a pocket camera. I increasingly chose cityscapes and nature as my subjects, but I also started to take my first detailed shots. I continued this with my first analogue SLR cameras. The nature photos became a little less, and I photographed more while travelling and experimented with portraits. Over the years, my preference for black and white has grown and solidified. Today, I publish almost exclusively black and white works and have shown them at my first small exhibitions. From time to time, I shoot analogue, but mostly digital. Photography is like a journey for me that goes on and on.
In what ways do culture and art inform your photographic vision?
Travelling has also enabled me to get to know new cultures and mentalities. I often try, both consciously and unconsciously, to transfer these new impressions into my way of photography, but also to depict them directly in the picture. I received a lot of inspiration in some European countries and also partly on the American continent. When I see something new; cities, nature, people, or architecture, for example, I often get ideas to realise this in my photos. In this respect, other cultures inspire me deeply and trigger a creative process in me. I have also had many wonderful experiences with local people.
Art also inspires me, although it doesn’t necessarily have to be photography. When I see a sculpture, a drawing, or a film, for example, it often sparks an idea for a photographic realisation. However, it never amounts to copying art from another medium into photography. These impressions pass through a mental filter in me. In this sense, art exhibitions are also a source of inspiration.
Cultures and art open the mind, if you allow yourself to get involved. That’s been my experience. External influences often trigger something in me, and what comes out in the end always has a lot to do with myself: feelings, ideas, perspectives... but the impulse often comes from the art and culture I observe and feel.
What role do subtle details play in the significance of your work?
I usually say that the motifs find me. Sometimes I have a theme beforehand, but often not. Then I let myself drift and find an interesting place or thing to photograph. It's a kind of intuition. I then engage with the subject, and often it's a fine detail that attracts me. I see the whole scene, but also the small, subtle things. Sometimes it is precisely these things that are important in the message of the picture or that attract the viewer's gaze.
Small, subtle things are also important to me when I'm editing the photos. It's often the little things that you hardly notice, or only subconsciously, but which change the overall impression of a photograph. It can be a small object, a light, a shape, a subtle change in perspective, or much more. In this respect, small things often play a big role. And for me, photography has a lot to do with intuition, feeling, and subtlety.
"Art gives peace to the soul."
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