About

As an artist I work with a variety of procedures and strategies in and with photography, and for the last 25 years have taught fine art at the HBK Braunschweig (Braunschweig University of Art), with photography as my specialist focus.

Statement

Shallow depth of field What is an image? What makes something an image? How does a photograph become an image? For me photography means working with fragments of reality, experimenting with acquired material in an analogue or digital photographic process with the purpose of establishing a distinct and intense, yet also open connection to the world. Allowing all that is wild, dark, intangible and beautiful in an image to preserve or to achieve its impact, in an open, stimulating and surprising form, very large or very small.

Education

  • 1970 –1976 | Hochschule für Bildende Künste Hamburg (DE)

Institution (Work Experience)

  • 1991 - 2016 | Professor for Fine Art Photography at the Art Academy Braunschweig (DE)

Selected Awards

  • 1999 | Projektstipendium, Stiftung Kunstfonds Bonn – Buchprojekt (DE)
  • 1990 | Arbeitsstipendium, Stiftung Kunstfonds Bonn (DE)
  • 1989 | Stipendium, Künstlerstätte Schloss Bleckede (DE)
  • 1988 | Stipendium, Barkenhoff-Stiftung Worpswede (DE)
  • 1985 | Erster Preis für Junge Europäische Fotografen, Deutsche Leasing AG (DE)
  • 1985 | Stipendium für Zeitgenössische Fotografie, Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach-Stiftung, Essen (DE)
  • 1981 | Stipendium, Deutsch-Französisches Jugendwerk, Workshops in Arles und Bonn (FR/DE)

Selected Exhibitions/Publications

  • 2019 | Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg (DE)
  • 2018 | Stadtmuseum München (DE)
  • 2015 | Alfred Ehrhardt Stiftung, Berlin (DE)
  • 2009 | Haus der Photographie, Deichtorhallen Hamburg (DE)
  • 2004 | Museum Folkwang, Essen (DE)
  • 2004 | Moskauer Haus der Fotografie (RU)
  • 2004 | City Gallery Prague (CZ)
  • 2003 | Museum Bochum (DE)
  • 2003 | Deutsches Historisches Museum Berlin (DE)
  • 1997 | White Columns, New York (US)
  • 1997 | Maison Européenne de la Photographie Paris (FR)
  • 1993 | Galerie Bouqueret & Lebon, Paris (FR)
  • 1992 | Galerie Elke Dröscher, Hamburg (DE)
  • 1992 | Derby Photofestival (GB)
  • 1989 | Galerie Fotohof, Salzburg (AT)
  • 1989 | Centre Pompidou, Paris (FR)
  • 1988 | Sprengel Museum Hannover (DE)
  • 1988 | Goethe Institutes (worldwide)
  • 1988 | Houston Photo Festival (US)
  • 1988 | FRAC Marseille (FR)
  • 1987 | Badischer Kunstverein Karlsruhe (DE)
  • 1987 | ICP New York (US)
  • 1986 | Museum Folkwang, Essen (DE)
  • 1986 | Galerie F.C. Gundlach, Hamburg (DE)
  • 1985 | Kunstverein Pforzheim (DE)
  • 1982 | Museum Folkwang Essen (DE)
  • 1982 | Rencontres Internationales, Arles (FR)

Personal Website

http://www.doerte-eissfeldt.de

Works

Dörte Eißfeldt | Snowball (1988)

Dörte Eißfeldt | Snowball (1988)

The series shows a snowball in a hand outstretched towards the camera. With the aid of different interpretations of a single negative, an image series totalling 32 enlargements arose which utilises photography’s resources as visual practice in order to emphasise formal properties of plasticity and dimensionality in the spectrum from black to white. The snowball thus becomes an ambiguous object: ephemeral matter, universal form and aesthetically sensual image creation.

Format:

Photo / Video

Dörte Eißfeldt | Attempt to show an Animal (1988)

Dörte Eißfeldt | Attempt to show an Animal (1988)

“Attempt at Exhibiting an Animal” and “Animal (Centre Pompidou)” are works on the representational function of photography as an imaging process and on its specific symbolism, which oscillates in this context between depiction of reality and imagined picture. The representation of an animal undergoes a transition into an image that visualises the animal’s fur as grainy texture on paper.

Format:

Photo / Video

Dörte Eißfeldt | Agfa Brovira (2011)

Dörte Eißfeldt | Agfa Brovira (2011)

Agfa Brovira was one of the first high-quality photographic papers produced in Germany and is no longer manufactured. The paper itself is a testimony to Germany’s industrial and technological history and became, in this context, the leading pictorial object and name-giver of the series. The backs of the exposed vintage paper were digitally photographed in the sunlight of the studio: a reverence to analogue photography in the indifferent field of the digital.

Format:

Photo / Video

Dörte Eißfeldt | Silversurfer (2012)

Dörte Eißfeldt | Silversurfer (2012)

Photographs of surfers in magazines served as image templates: first, they were copied for the work in the darkroom so that, next, the surfers could be relocated to a frameless space that is kept open. Credits: 01 Surfer Andy Irons, Photo Jeff Flindt 02 Surfer Andy Irons, Photo Jeff Flindt 04 Surfer Dave Rastovich, Photo Todd Glaser 07 Surfer Chris Ward, Photo Tom Carey 11 Surfer Ry Craike, Photo Jamie Scott 15 Surfer Chippa Wilson, Photo Matthew O’Brien 29 Surfer Michi Mohr, Photo Birgar Olsen

Format:

Photo / Video