DE
Ralf Peters

Ralf Peters stages in his conceptual photography the character of everyday objects and locations, presenting them and their impressions in a new light. Reduced to their essentials, subjects such as bridges, petrol stations and landscapes are abstracted to the essence of their colour and form, appearing to dissolve into pixels. Peters challenges viewers to question what they see by blurring the line between photomontage and documentary photography. In doing so, he criticises the image aesthetics of consumer culture and the artificial world presented through digital image processing, which skews the human understanding of "reality".

The artist approaches his motifs conceptually; observation and documentation of moments are the starting points for his artistic practice. Peters studies and documents places and objects over long periods of time, carefully analyzing their details. He then assembles the various snapshots he's collected using a freely structured post-processing technique, changing and reshaping their structure. His image montages are created similarly to the manner in which a sculptor assembles materials into dimensional form, or how a painter might explore variant colours combining.

The artist's desire to depict the real, the human, the natural and urban, is recorded throughout the history of art and photography. Through the development of digital photography as a mass medium, the question of authenticity in presentation of the real has often been addressed playfully. In this respect, digital image-making rooting in abstraction and formal variation based a major current in the early history of digital photography of the late 1960s and 1970s. Early experiments such as those by Nancy Burson or Charles Csuri documented the characteristic features of the medium expressed through repetition and variation, and turned away from the idea of the original.

Ralf Peter's methodology is also located here. Subjects are transformed and abstracted until they become unrecognisable ciphers of their original form, and as Hito Steyerl also attests in contemporary photography, shakes up the perception of the real.

Ralf Peters studied at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste Braunschweig, the École des Beaux Arts in Nîmes and the Akademie der Bildenden Künste Munich. At the beginning of his professional career he used the traditional media of painting and sculpture, before dedicating himself to photography and digital photomontage since the late 1990s. Ralf Peters lives and works in Hamburg.

Selected works

Segel
Segel, 2022
In Out
In Out, 2022
Outlook 1 - 3
Outlook 1 - 3, 2022
Transfer 1
Transfer 1, 2022
Transfer 4
Transfer 4, 2022
Aquarium 2
Aquarium 2, 2022
Pleasure 1
Pleasure 1, 2022
Pleasure 2
Pleasure 2, 2022
Pleasure 3
Pleasure 3, 2022
Fragility
Fragility, 2021 - 2022
Winter #31
Winter #31, 2016 - 2021
Winter #32
Winter #32, 2016 - 2021
Winter #21
Winter #21, 2016 - 2021
Fog
Fog, 2020
Paragliders
Paragliders, 2017

Exhibitions

THINGS BEHIND THINGS
THINGS BEHIND THINGS
21.04. - 25.06.2022
Ralf Peters, Marten Schech
Winter, Keen Insight
Winter, Keen Insight
31.03. - 27.05.2017
Keen Insight
Keen Insight
12.09. - 15.11.2014
Night Colours
Night Colours
03.02. - 26.03.2011
24 Hours
24 Hours
03.04. - 17.05.2008
Sculptural Photography
Sculptural Photography
17.04. - 19.06.2004

Edition

Herbst 3
Herbst 3, 2020
Herbst 2
Herbst 2, 2020
Herbst 1
Herbst 1, 2020
gelb, grün, rot, blau
gelb, grün, rot, blau, 2020
Berg-Boote
Berg-Boote, 2014
Golf Japan
Golf Japan, 2014
Tree
Tree, 2010
Different Persons I
Different Persons I, 2006
Tankstelle Süd
Tankstelle Süd, 2005
Mole 2
Mole 2, 2004
Mole 3
Mole 3, 2004
Boot
Boot, 2004
Hafen
Hafen, 2004
Mole 1
Mole 1, 2004
Ralf Peters
Ralf Peters, 2015
Until Today
Until Today, 2010
Plastische Fotografie
Plastische Fotografie, 2004

Architecture

Keen Insight - Zurich
Keen Insight - Zurich, 2016 - 2018

Channel

THINGS BEHIND THINGS: Meeting Marten Schech & Ralf Peters
THINGS BEHIND THINGS: Meeting Marten Schech & Ralf Peters, 2022-05-14 15:44:39
Ralf Peters, Marten Schech
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