BERLIN.- Galerie Springer Berlin announced the group exhibition »Animals«. The show presents photographic works by Edward Burtynsky, Maria Jauregui Ponte, Ute Mahler, Werner Mahler, Loredana Nemes, Arnold Odermatt, Aitor Ortiz, and Stefanie Seufert, with guest artists Ursula Böhmer and Mirjana Vrbaški, complemented by works from a private collection. Several of the participating artists will be present at the opening.

On the curatorial concept

The exhibition does not aim for a documentary depiction of the animal world, but for a reflection on the artistic gaze itself: what moves each photographer to choose a particular subject, and how does the image take shape in the creative process? Many of the works are marked by a remarkable intimacy and familiarity in the relationship between the image-maker and the depicted creature — the works of Ursula Böhmer, Stefanie Seufert, Maria Jauregui Ponte, and Mirjana Vrbaški, for instance, can be read as portraits expressing a deep emotional connection.

This immediate appeal lies not solely in a romanticized longing for nature, but in the fragility and vulnerability of our world, which the photographs address and which raise urgent questions — among them, the ethics of animal husbandry. This is especially evident in Ursula Böhmer's series »All Ladies«, for which the artist traveled across Europe photographing cows in pastures. Mirjana Vrbaški's bird portraits, made in zoological gardens, lend their subjects a surprising dignity and strength of character.





Arnold Odermatt's works captivate through their quiet objectivity, in which — for all their documentary rigor — a subtle humor and a humanist sensibility also emerge. This quality runs like a thread through the work of Ute Mahler and Werner Mahler as well, as their selection of works from different creative periods shows — among them Ute Mahler's fashion photographs from the 1990s, in which animals already appear as a natural part of the composition. A trompe l'œil by Werner Mahler rounds out the presentation and also serves as the exhibition's cover image. Standing apart is the work of Ingar Krauss: a taxidermied hare whose lifelike, alert posture deliberately blurs the line between the living and the preserved.

Edward Burtynsky's work does not center on the individual: his wide view of flamingos at Lake Bogoria, Kenya, depicts a seemingly untouched natural landscape whose water levels have risen dramatically due to climate change, increasingly displacing the birds from their traditional feeding grounds.