Michael Wolf (photographer)

Michael Wolf (photographer)

Michael Wolf (born 1954) is a German artist and photographer who lives and works in Hong Kong and Paris.[1]

Contents

Biography

Wolf was born in Germany and was raised in the United States, Europe, and Canada.[2] He attended the North Toronto Collegiate Institute and the University of California, Berkeley.[3] In 1976 he obtained a degree in visual communication at the University of Essen, Germany, where he studied with Otto Steinert.[3]

Wolf began his career as a photojournalist, spending eight years working in Hong Kong for the German magazine Stern.[2] He won a first prize in Contemporary Issues in the 2004 World Press Photo competition for his photographs for an article in Stern entitled China: Factory of the World.[4] The photographs depicted workers in several types of factories.[4]

Wolf states that a decline in the magazine industry led to photojournalism assignments becoming "stupid and boring."[5] In 2003 he decided to work only on fine-art photography projects.[5]

Notable artistic projects

Bastard Chairs / Sitting in China

He began non-editorial photography with a series entitled Bastard Chairs, small chairs that Chinese people would repair repeatedly using whatever materials were available.[6][7] Wolf reports that the police detained him twice during the photographing of the series for "doing something which was harmful to the Chinese state."[8] Photographs from the series were published a 2002 book entitled Sitting in China.[6] Although Wolf called the bastard chairs a "great symbol of the Chinese people's thriftiness and resourcefulness," and the book received positive reviews in the West, some Chinese people felt that the photographs made China appear "backward."[7][9][10]

The Real Toy Story

In follow-up to the China: Factory of the World series, Wolf created an installation entitled The Real Toy Story.[11] It consisted of 20,000 toys made in China and purchased in California that Wolf attached with magnets to the walls of the gallery, along with photographs of workers making the toys.[6][11]

Architecture of Density

In this series, Wolf photographed of Hong Kong's tall buildings in a way that depicted them as "abstractions, never-ending repetitions of architectural patterns."[12] The photographs excluded the sky and the ground, thereby emphasizing the vertical lines of the buildings.[13] The images have been compared with those of Andreas Gursky and Candida Höfer.[14]

The first book containing images from the series, Hong Kong: Front Door/ Back Door, was published in 2005.[13][15] One review noted the book's "representation of an overpopulated city emptied of its human presence" and praised "the visual intelligence of Wolf's photographs."[15] The Outside volume of Wolf's two-volume 2009 book Hong Kong Inside Outside contained a more extensive selection of photographs from this series.[13]

100x100

In 2006, Wolf took photographs of residents in their rooms in a building in Hong Kong's oldest public housing complex, the Shek Kip Mei Estate, that was going to be demolished.[16] He used a wide-angle lens to show as much of the interiors of the rooms as possible.[17] Each room was approximately 100 square feet (9.3 m2) in size, and he displayed photographs of 100 rooms, leading to the name "100x100."[16] In an interview, Wolf likened the series to a scientific project, "an investigation into the use of limited space."[8] The Inside volume of Wolf's two-volume book Hong Kong Inside Outside of 2009 contained the complete photographs from this series.[13][17]

Copy Art / Real Fake Art

Between 2005 and 2007, Wolf photographed painters in Shenzhen, China, who reproduced famous works of art such as Sunflowers by Vincent van Gogh.[18] Each portrait consisted of a "copy artist" along with an example of a copied work.[18] The settings were described as "dirty alleyways and street corners."[19] One reviewer wrote that the pictures "document intimate cultural and economic facets of globalization even as they record and complicate critical dilemmas about authenticity and the non-economic values of art."[20] The series was collected in his book Real Fake Art published in 2011.

Transparent City

A series shot in downtown Chicago beginning in 2006 that "combine[d] impersonal cityscapes shot primarily at dusk or at night with details of the buildings’ inhabitants" became the basis for the 2008 book Transparent City.[21] The photographs were taken from rooftops at dusk with a long lens.[22] As in the Architecture of Density series, the exterior photographs excluded the horizon and the sky, leaving the windows of the buildings as the main subjects.[22] In one interview, Wolf said that he came upon the idea of showing close-ups of people in the windows after he noticed that a man giving him the finger in a photograph.[23] In another interview, Wolf cited the artistic work of Edward Hopper as an inspiration for the series because of its voyeuristic nature and its inclusion of architectural details.[22]

Articles about the book connected the photographs to the film Rear Window by Alfred Hitchcock.[12][24][25] One reviewer described the book as "frightening," causing a feeling of "remoteness."[22] The series was controversial because some people felt that the cropped and enlarged photographs of people in the buildings constituted an invasion of privacy.[21] In 2010, the series was shortlisted for the Prix Pictet.[26]

Tokyo Compression

In the 2010 book Tokyo Compression, Wolf presented portraits of Japanese people inside crowded Tokyo subway trains who had been pressed against a window.[27][28] The commuters' expressions were characterized in one review as "traumatised" and "woeful."[28] Wolf stated that some people closed their eyes or hid their faces with their hands upon realizing that they were being photographed.[28]

One reviewer concluded that Wolf's Architecture of Density, Transparent City, and Tokyo Compression series represented a progression from long shot to close-up.[14] Wolf won a first prize in Daily Life in the 2009 World Press Photo competition for his Tokyo Compression work.[29] Martin Parr selected the 2010 book as one of the 30 most influential photobooks published between 2001 and 2010.[30]

Series using Google Street View

In several series, such as Paris Street View, Manhattan Street View, and A Series of Unfortunate Events, Wolf took photographs of Google Street View scenes on his computer screen.[12][31][32] Wolf compared his method of finding interesting scenes online to those of a street photographer walking around in a city.[12] He has called his Street View series "a statement about art."[33]

The Street View photographs were characterized by pixelation and image noise which were compared with techniques used by Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol in their art.[12] The work led to discussion of how the automatically-taken Google Street View images affected the "decisive moment" concept of Henri Cartier-Bresson; nevertheless, the photographs were said to contain "some mystery" in that they were "hard to interpret."[12][14] Some of Wolf's photographs resemble recognized classics of photography such as Le baiser de l'hôtel de ville (The Kiss) by Robert Doisneau.[12]

Wolf won an honorable mention in Daily Life in the 2011 World Press Photo competition for his A Series of Unfortunate Events work.[34] The award was controversial because some people were of the opinion that the appropriation of Google Street View screens did not constitute photojournalism.[35]

Selected exhibitions

Among the exhibitions of Wolf's work,[36] notable ones include:

  • 2003: Portraits of Chinese People, John Batten Gallery, Hong Kong[7]
  • 2005: Architecture of Density, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco[37]
  • 2006: Made in China, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago (group exhibit including The Real Toy Story)[38]
  • 2006: The Real Toy Story, Museum of Work, Hamburg[11]
  • 2006: 100 X 100, Goethe Institute, Hong Kong[16]
  • 2007: Chinese Copy Art, Goethe Institute, Hong Kong[18]
  • 2007: Copy Art and 100 x 100, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco[20]
  • 2008-2009: Transparent City, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago[23][39]
  • 2008-2009: Transparent City, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco[24]
  • 2010: Paris Street View, Foam Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam[40]
  • 2010: iseeyou, Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York[14][41]
  • 2010: Life in Cities, m97 Gallery, Shanghai[42]
  • 2011: Tokyo Compression, Forum für Fotografie Köln[28][43]

Selected collections

Selected books

References

  1. ^ Biography. Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  2. ^ a b World Press Photo. Michael Wolf. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  3. ^ a b m97 Gallery. Michael Wolf. Artist Info. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  4. ^ a b World Press Photo. 2004, Michael Wolf, 1st Prize, Contemporary Issues Stories. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  5. ^ a b Interview with Michael Wolf. Seconds2Real, February 7, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  6. ^ a b c An Interview with Michael Wolf. Holy Ghost Zine, August 8, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  7. ^ a b c Lau, Joyce Hor-Chung. Portrait of a Nation. South China Morning Post, November 9, 2003.
  8. ^ a b Colberg, Jörg. A Conversation with Michael Wolf. Conscientious Extended, August 31, 2006. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  9. ^ Press, Joy. Fan Fare: Collecting This Season's Coffee-Table Books. Village Voice, December 3, 2002. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  10. ^ Baker, Kenneth. The Art of Finding the Right Book: Paintings and Photographs Highlight Five Distinctive Volumes. San Francisco Chronicle, December 15, 2002. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  11. ^ a b c Rüggeberg, Stefanie. Made in China. Museum der Arbeit: Installation mit 20 000 Spielzeugen. Der Fotograf Michael Wolf hat sich in Chinas Spielzeugfabriken umgesehen. Hamburger Abendblatt, September 5, 2006. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g Feustel, Marc. Towards a New Street Photography. Foam Magazine #22, Spring 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  13. ^ a b c d Day, Lara. Photographer Michael Wolf's Tall Order. Time Magazine, January 25, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  14. ^ a b c d Hall, Emily. Michael Wolf: Bruce Silverstein. Artforum, January 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  15. ^ a b Loh, Maria. Made in Hong Kong. The Art Book, Volume 13, Issue 2, pages 3–5, May 2006.
  16. ^ a b c Lau, Kit-wai. End of an Era. South China Morning Post, November 1, 2006.
  17. ^ a b Lapinski, Valerie. Showcase: A Room of Everyone's Own. Lens Blog, New York Times, November 13, 2009. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  18. ^ a b c Chan, Michelle. The Art of Copying. The Standard, May 5, 2007. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  19. ^ Lavapie, James. Michael Wolf: Capturing Counterfeit. Corduroy Magazine blog, July 18, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  20. ^ a b Baker, Kenneth. Searching for Meaning within a Forest of Asterisks. San Francisco Chronicle, May 12, 2007. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  21. ^ a b Estrin, James. Showcase: Life Behind Glass. Lens Blog, New York Times, July 2, 2009. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  22. ^ a b c d Hockenberry, John. Leaves of Glass. Metropolis, vol. 28, no. 4, pages 80-87, November 2008. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  23. ^ a b Michael Wolf ("As told to Brian Sholis"). ArtForum, November 14, 2008. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  24. ^ a b Szupinska, Joanna. Michael Wolf: Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, California. ArtUS, no. 27, page 20, September 2009. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  25. ^ Casper, Jim. Photo Book Review. The Transparent City. Lens Culture, volume 19, January-March 2009. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  26. ^ Rose, Rebecca. Growing Pains. FT.com (Financial Times), March 18, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  27. ^ McCurry, Justin. Going Underground, Tokyo Style. The Guardian, December 1, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  28. ^ a b c d Williams, Holly. The End of the Line: Michael Wolf's Photographs of the Tokyo Rush Hour Will Make Every Commuter Shudder. The Independent, January 15, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  29. ^ World Press Photo. 2009, Michael Wolf, 1st prize, Daily Life. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  30. ^ PhotoIreland Festival announces Martin Parr’s selection of the 30 most influential photobooks of the last decade. July 1-31, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  31. ^ Pasulka, Nicole. Iseeyou. The Morning News, November 1, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  32. ^ Casper, Jim. A Series of Unfortunate Events. Lens Culture, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  33. ^ Photo: The Invisible Paris (interview with Michael Wolf). The Outlook Magazine, issue 100, August 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  34. ^ World Press Photo. 2011, Contemporary Issues, Honorable Mention stories. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  35. ^ Laurent, Olivier. World Press Photo: Is Google Street View Photojournalism? British Journal of Photography, February 11, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  36. ^ Chronology. Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  37. ^ Baker, Kenneth. Fascinating, Frightening Glimpses of Urban Density. San Francisco Chronicle, January 22, 2005. Retrieved August 18, 2011.
  38. ^ Hanke, Emma. The Art of Work: Photo Exhibit Details Economic Development. The Daily Northwestern, January 19, 2006. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  39. ^ Weinberg, Lauren. Michael Wolf & "Work/Place." Time Out Chicago, December 10, 2008. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  40. ^ Alessi, Andrea. Michael Wolf: Mining Google Street View. ArtSlant Amsterdam, March 22, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  41. ^ Bonanos, Christopher. Ghosts in the Machine: Michael Wolf Lets Google Do the Stalking. New York magazine, October 10, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  42. ^ Tang Lingjie. Michael Wolf: Life in Cities. LEAP: the International Art Magazine of Contemporary China, volume 6, December 1, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  43. ^ Weckesser, Markus. Bilder im Minutentakt. die Tageszeitung, January 13, 2011. Retrieved August 18, 2011.
  44. ^ Brooklyn Museum. Collections: Michael Wolf. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  45. ^ Milwaukee Art Museum. Annual Report 2005. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  46. ^ Museum Folkwang. Künstler. Fotografie. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  47. ^ Museum of Contemporary Photography. Wolf, Michael. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  48. ^ Chetchotisak, Chet. The Communist Superhero. New book of Chinese Communist Posters Captures Complexity of Chairman Mao. Bangkok Post, July 8, 2010. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  49. ^ Siegel, Steffen. Visueller Beifang im Netz. die Tageszeitung, April 2, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.
  50. ^ Hodgson, Francis. Michael Wolf - Tokyo Compression Revisited. May 13, 2011. Retrieved August 15, 2011.

External links


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