That silence that lasts a few seconds: a ray of sunshine filters through the windows like a beam of light, illuminating the specks of dust floating in the air; for just a moment, the mind is nothing more than the passing image. A body plunges into the sea, before returning to the surface, everything is water, deep, muffled silence. The first blaze of a campfire, the empty hall of a cinema. The stars, the distance.
Indefinitely is that moment of intimate silence that binds us to life, that freezes time, action, judgment. It's the space between reality and imagination. It's the transition from sleep to the perception of the new day's sun.
Katrin Koenning captures observation itself, in its purity; her shots translate a sense of pause that has to do with listening.
This long-term series is the result of a personal work; characters dear to her often appear in her photographs, and yet no implication is obvious. The photographer throws away all affective filters that connect her to the portrayed subjects, moving into a universal level, where the only known system is that of 'correspondences', which we've all had perception at some point in life.
Katrin was born in the industrial Ruhrgebiet area, in Germany, before moving to Australia at the age of 25. The move to a completely different culture influenced her artistic research, in which the physical and emotional connection with a site plays a central role in the development of her work. Based on still photography and the moving image, the artist captures unintentionally evocative pictures, suggesting a 'return to things', and attention to the interconnections passing through them.
It comes to my mind one of artist Jenny Holzer's phrases: "All things are delicately interconnected"; with visual suggestions, Katrin Koenning defines this meaning.
