Uncaged, N° 9 2019
Taking pictures of „birds in cages“ became one ( of many ) recurrent themes in my photography. Driven by curiosity, fascination and pity, watching animals in cages. On birds you can go really closed while taking the picture and watching birds in cages is a very sad thing. They are separated from their natural environment, confined in a too small space, separated from the „outside“ behind thin bars. The series originally called BIRDS IN CAGES, reflects the social, religious and also individual mindset of the people „holding“ birds. All pictures of this series ( in total 25 color images ) were taken between 2008 – 2020 and in the beginning the work was meant to stay purely photographic. With UNGAGED, I have made the approach to cover the cage bars and blur out the edges and structures partially with acrylic paint applied onto the print. The birds seem a bit more free now and the picture as well is shifting from photograph of captured birds, back into a more unique and floating state.
Uncaged, N° 14 2018
Uncaged, N° 2 2019
Note: The text above was written by the Artist. No modification was made by COCA.
Olaf Wipperfürth
France
Olaf Wipperfürth is a photography artist born in Düsseldorf ( Germany )
He lives and works currently in Paris.
Olaf Wipperfürth studied philosophy and art history in Germany before moving to Paris in the late nineties to finalize his doctorate, “the “moment”- in contemporary art and philosophy”, published in 1999. After his doctorate and supplementary studies at the Düsseldorf Kunst Academie, he exclusively dedicated his life to photography and film, projecting his theoretical and conceptual knowledge into his artistic universe.
Working mostly with photography he uses also more recently paint interventions on his photographs as shown here. His work explores mainly the themes of absence, abstraction, trace and ephemeral space. His art is shown in various exhibitions and book publications and got awarded TIFA – the Tokyo International Foto Awards. 2018 and PX3 – Prix de la photographie, Paris. 2018 for his work on Sumo Wrestler in Japan.