Daan Paans

Photographer

Dimensions of time play an important role my projects. In line with this, a key theme in my work includes the desire to gain an understanding, in the broadest sense, of the transhistorical variability of image-making. The imagery explores blind spots in our visual historiography, and shows us hypothetical archetypes from the natural, scientific, and science-fiction world. My works begin with a documentary approach. By means of artistic research the projects usually result in a number of works using various media, and with an emphasis on photography. Despite departing from documentary material, in the final works fact and fiction are interchanged and I (deliberately) let them come at odds with one another. A historical narrative is often the starting point of my projects. Such a story should have a recognizable link with the current zeitgeist. I question my subject by taking images (that I make myself) and contrasting them with one another with the aim to deconstruct the processes surrounding image-making. Using this method in my most recent project Rhinoceros, on the basis of three case studies, I pose one central question: In what way and to what extent do imaginary representations of the future and the past influence our worldview?