Ricardo Nagaoka
Artist Feature
Every week an artist is featured whose single image was published by Der Greif. The Feature shows the image in the original context of the series.
Jessica Wolfelsperger - Saga
Mar 27, 2019
“Saga” was made in the Verzasca Valley in Switzerland (my homecountry) during my Artist Residency of the Verzasca Foto Festival. As I live currently in Berlin – a big bustling and pulsating metropolis – it was a big contrast to live for nearly two months in the complete nature back to basic without distraction everywhere, nor having constantly wi-fi. Nature is beautiful, strong and healthy, it sharpens our senses and calms you down. It was good not looking at my iphone, instead looking at the trees and mountains. That made me think a lot about our world we live in.
Saga (2017)
A hundred souls village in the Verzasca Valley, surrounded by mountains amidst pure nature. For some weeks, isolated from the outside world, it seems. In a traditional stone house near the river, amidst the secluded beautiful mysticism. Enchanted by this valley, I read the ancient myths and legends of the region and feel the aura. They exemplarily address the discussion with nature, whereby the nature of the human being is also meant. Behind them are representations of faith, which are expressed symbolically. In search of the experience of a divine or absolute reality, I discover and explore my homeland new and wash myself – according to the life philosophy of Monte Verità – free from my daily life in the bustling metropolis and devise my own legend.
Artist Blog
The blog of Der Greif is written entirely by the artists who have been invited to doing an Artist-Feature. Every week, we have a different author.
Published in:
»Guest-Room Tim Clark«
Do you know who I am
Apr 02, 2019 - Jessica Wolfelsperger
Today everything exists to end in a photograph.” ― Susan Sontag
Do you know who I am is my newest and still an ongoing project that focuses on homogenization in the Western world in terms of instagram / social media and its immediacy in using a smartphone and creating constantly and instantly pictures. I produced this new body of work for Parallel – European Photo Based Platform. I am working with photography, video, generated textforms from the internet and with performance. These pictures are only a first insight. It will be shown the next months in three different venues:
22nd May at Chateau d’eau in Toulouse, France
4th July at Photo Ireland Festival in Dublin, Ireland
11th September at Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center in Budapest, Hungary
27th November during PARALLEL Review in Lisbon, Portugal
Hide + Seek
Mar 29, 2019 - Jessica Wolfelsperger
Fear of falling asleep at night.
Fear of not falling asleep.
Fear of the past rising up.
Fear of the present taking flight.
Fear of the telephone that rings in the dead of night.
Fear of electrical storms.
Fear of the cleaning woman who has a spot on her cheek!
Fear of dogs I’ve been told won’t bite.
Fear of anxiety!
Fear of having to identify the body of a dead friend.
Fear of running out of money.
Fear of having too much, though people will not believe this.
Fear of psychological profiles.
Fear of being late and fear of arriving before anyone else.
Fear of my children’s handwriting on envelopes.
Fear they’ll die before I do, and I’ll feel guilty.
Fear of having to live with my mother in her old age, and mine.
Fear of confusion.
Fear this day will end on an unhappy note.
Fear of waking up to find you gone.
Fear of not loving and fear of not loving enough.
Fear that what I love will prove lethal to those I love.
Fear of death.
Fear of living too long.
Fear of death.
I’ve said that.
by Raymond Carver
“Hide + Seek” is a series about anxiety. Each era creates its own fears, where new anxiety emerges. Classic phobias remain constant, but they are always seeking for current objects. We are free but sometimes we are locked up in our own heads.
Lonely Planet
Mar 28, 2019 - Jessica Wolfelsperger
The weight of the world
is love.
Under the burden
of solitude,
under the burden
of dissatisfaction
the weight,
the weight we carry
is love.
Allen Ginsberg
More or less each of us knows times when we feel lonely. It may have simple reasons, like being away from home or having problems with friends, family or work. We can feel emotionally cut off from our environment. Or we have the feeling, we can‘t share what is happening within us. This work visualizes this sense of isolation. I‘m concerned about the loneliness of modern mankind, the single society, the anonymity of the big city and the rivalry in capitalism. Loneliness exists and is not a small problem. It is a malnutrition of our soul.
