Gregor Schuster

Photographer

[gregor-schuster]

JAGUAR E-Type V12 California

[gregor-schuster]

A little photographic work on the Osthang Project, a part of the Architektursommer Rhein-Main 2014. These are temporary buildings during the summer academy.

website architectural photography

[gregor-schuster]

LUXLIGHT - The Schlumpf Collection

Another Set of Oldtimers, shot at a guest exhibition in Kassel / Germany. This was a special selection of vehicles that had never been restored and where hidden in various barns and factory halls until the bankruptcy of the collecting factory owners. Most of the restored collection formed the museum "cité de l'automobile" in Mulhouse / France. 

[gregor-schuster]

Toy Cars

[gregor-schuster]

Ancestors - Patchwork Family Portraits.

In times of patchwork family relations we create new forms of social relations. Beside of all the possibilities of social freedom there is still a strong desire to create a kind of informal pedigree, to give everyone a relational based place in our social environment. In my work i use the classical narrative elements of aristocratic background settings, to situates the portrayed person in a social and spiritual position. In a second step i give them the same paper-mask to wear. This gives them a certain mutuality by hiding individual aspects in favor of a common physical appearance as if they would really come from one family tree. With my work i am creating a connection between myself and all the people in my life, as well as give them a relation between each others, making them my gallery of ancestors.

[gregor-schuster]

BLACKWOOD

Following the footsteps of little red riding hood in the forbidden and dark parts of the woods, all of the subconscious energies of the forest suddenly reveal themselves. In an enchanted and transcended state of mind the scenery becomes a theatrical space of imagination. The equivalency of bright and dark, far and near and in the absence of our learned color scales we are able to enter in the consciousness of the forest itself.

Become a creature of the woods and leave all fear behind.

...and referring to Photographer John Hillards image " Sycamore Exposure" from 1977.

---

Exposed at the Noorderlicht Photo Festival in 2012

[gregor-schuster]

Plant / Plantation

Plant is a ambiguous word, a fabrication construction or an organic floral organism. In these nightshots it becomes the dual faced setting of an possible abandoned civilization. Those plants appear like the inhabitants of an urban structure which keeps them hostage and exploited. Maybe the restrictive forces are long gone, but the plants don't dare to leave their gated surroundings. In a contra-dictional moment, life freezes under a windless moonlight.

[gregor-schuster]

Eden / Paradise

Paradise keeps existing after the disappearance of its inhabitants. In this series I am working on the idea of paradise as a garden. As an ideal place it has two essential characteristics for my work, namely, the demarcation of a specific place against an outside world and on the other hand, as an coming to end of any time.

I've taken pictures in the space in front of this border wall, where a seemingly-planned vegetation is in the transition to an uncontrolled and solidified growth. Paradise keeps existing after the disappearance of its inhabitants, and the unreal place before the wall becomes a waiting room for the possible return of man. But which side are we really? The pictures themselves give only vague hints, these closed doors , are they entrances or exits? Is that the tree of knowledge? What if the other side just looks the same? So the Garden of Eden becomes a stage, but the curtain does not raise. A hermetic room full of imagined pictures.

See the installation Video

[gregor-schuster]

Believer

Initializing moment to this work have been little self constructed shrines i found in small villages across the canary islands, images of a good-looking young man, obviously coming from previous times. The pseudo realistic presentation of the holy family members as a self reassurance of their existence was doubled by adding multiple layers of photographic surfaces over the images to give them an even more documentary proof that there is some real to be pictured. But the strong gestures and exaggerated poses were more like actors on a theatre stage, so i gave them emblematic ingredients for the drama. Curtains, portals and stage room as a sign of retelling a story. I incorporated element of historic paper theaters, which were used to replay the theatre piece for the children at home, who were not allowed to attend the real show in theaters at hat time.

By recombining these elements, i created my own little shrines with all the slices and traces of time and references a strong story creates over a long period of time.

[gregor-schuster]

Renature

How do we want nature to look like? Starting point are parts of landscapes in dioramas, like for example of the America Museum of Natural History in New York. Like the animals are perfectly draped carcasses, the surrounding landscapes are a mixture of artifacts and scene-painting. The more it tries to be perfect the more futile it is. By adding photographic elements like blur, color shift, blending and cropping i revive the nature and make it a sensorial experience. My intervention goes just to the frontier where the eye is oscillating between true and false. Do we trust the visual signals of authenticity or do we discover the image of the image.

[gregor-schuster]

NYC Polaroids - Spikes

[gregor-schuster]

EVP - Products from the last decade of the GDR.

A small series i did in the last year of the existence of the GDR on the packaging design of popular products.

For those who are interested in pre-computer image manipulation: The images are a combination of a color pack shot on Fuji Velvia 4x5 inch film  and a detail shot in black and white on Lith film. Those two films were packed as a sandwich and the enlarged on a cross developed Kodak Vericolor print film in the format 8x10inch. Exhibition prints were Ilford Cibachrome 50x60 cm.