Gasoline III (Stranger than Paradise) - 1999

Edition 1/10,
120x120cm,
analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist, based on a Polaroid.
Certificate and Signature label.
Artist Inventory No. 271.01.
Not mounted.

Stefanie Schneider: A German view of the American West

The works of Stefanie Schneider evoke Ed Ruscha's obsession with the American experience, the richness of Georgia O'Keefe's deserts and the loneliness of Edward Hopper's haunting paintings. So how exactly did this German photographer become one of the most important artists of the American narrative of the 20th and 21st century?

Born in Germany in 1968, photographer Schneider used to divide her time between Berlin and Los Angeles from the 90's until settling permanently where her process begins in the American West, in locations such as the planes and deserts of Southern California, where she photographs her subjects. In Berlin, Schneider developed and enlarged her works by hand.

This theme of preservation and deterioration is a core part of Schneider's oeuvre. In an interview in October 2014 with Artnet, the artist explained how her own experiences of pain and loss inspire her. ''My work resembles my life: Love, lost and unrequited, leaves its mark in our lives as a senseless pain that has no place in the present.''

''The ex-lover experiences the residues of love as an amputee experiences the sensation of a ghost limb.'' - Stefanie Schneider

Schneider's subjects are often featured in apocalyptic settings: desert planes, trailer parks, oilfields, run-down motels and empty beaches, alone, or if not, not connected with one another. ''It is the tangible experience of ''absence'' that has inspired my work,'' explained Schneider.

Barnebys, May 3rd, 2017