“Ex Nihilo” – Benoit Vollmer

I’m totally busy with my bachelor thesis in fine arts right now. I decided to do the theoretical part on the subject of Bernd and Hilla Bechers’ work. Right now I’m reading a lot of books, making notes, writing stuff down and I’m preparing an interview with Ralf Brück, former student of Thomas Ruff and Bernd Becher. Maybe I’ll post some results when it’s finished. I just wanted to post some photography I found the last days. I pretty much like the series “Ex Nihilo”, Benoit Vollmer did in the european alps! He took photos of large ski resorts in the low season. Once the snow is gone, you can see the man-altered landscape.

Long story short, here’s a quote from his website:

“In his Ex Nihilo serie, Benoît Vollmer captures the atmosphere of low season ski resorts.
During the 1970s, building such resorts in these mountain ranges represented an amazing challenge. Benoît Vollmer’s vision of these residential complexes interrogates the notion of heritage that exceeds the ideas of achievement or failure. The shots of the surrounding environment put those bold experiences back in their context.

Here, the artistic choice was to create a serie during the low season, a time when a certain strange atmosphere pervades those places. Places not yet covered in snow, seemingly forsaken. Once they’ve lost their functions, they start existing for themselves. To show this phenomenon is to show what goes on living at the margins of unreality when we’re not there to see it, This set of images that could be seen as purely documentary stages a ghost town simulacrum. We could also view it as a mere model reminiscent of the original meaning of utopia, a place that does not exist and invites various forms of imaginations.”

…aaand as always: There are some more photos on his website. Take a look: http://www.benoitvollmer.com