I was already a little familiar with Struth's works as he's part of the so-called « Dusseldorfer photo schule » and had the Becher couple as mentor. Neverthless, the exhibition shows pictures covering over 30 years of his work, which is so diverse that it's likely you'll see some novelties.
His early works of lifeless streets in black and white for example, were continued in colour, showing the streets of Lima. The pastel colours and absence of shadows make it look a little like one of those hyperrealistic paintings and create the strange effect of making volumes disappear.
Then, what's very impressive with most of the photos is their very big size and precision. The scenes of jungle (one of those was used for the poster), the contemporary China, the space shuttle, the monuments, the family scenes... are all in this wide format.
My favourite series (beside Lima):
Chinese lanscapes of cities and factories in conctruction, the horizon full of cranes
Pairs of pictures assembled in an ironic way. A road circled by trees in a US natural park, a rock hill standing out further away next to a huge Las Vegas hotel looking strangely similar to the rock hill of the first picture. Several unfinished buildings with only the concrete structure yet completed in Seoul against an empty (looking closely, you can nevertheless see a couple of persons on a basketball field) street sided by frightening raw concrete buildings in Pyonyang.
Tourists and monuments / tourists in museums: I've found this quite ironic as well, especially given we're at the place of the tourists at this time (of course you think: Do I look just as ridiculous right now?). Tourists in or in front of monuments seem like insignificant ants. This sensation is the strongest in Rome's Pantheon, whose structure seem way out of reach of these little coloured things which just walked in. With tourists in museums, Struth tries to create a connexion between visitors in the picture, visitors of the exhibition and the works. Painted characters seem to be alive, just like visitors in the picture. And ourselves, as visitors, we don't know wether we're part of a mise en abîme or just observing the visitors becoming charachers.
Technical pictures as well create the impression these things can't be man made. Close look at a part of a space shuttle makes you scratch your head. And a view from the inside of the IPP Max Plank gives an impression of pure perfection.
I won't come back on jungles as they're by far what I've enjoyed the least. Family pictures are kind of interesting as they're much more human than the other works. It made me think a bit of Peter Menzel but without the journalistic interest. Didn't really get to me.
As a conclusion, I'd say: if you like photography, there is no way you miss it.
http://www.kunstsammlung.de/en.html
http://thomasstruth25.com/
