Click on the images to enlarge | All images: © Klaus Wehner, by
Courtesy of the Trustees of Sir John Soane's Museum
in London had been a favourite Museum of mine long before the
subject of museum culture became a central focus of my work. Its
creator, Sir John Soane (1753-1837) was one of the English Regency
era's most successful architects and a passionate collector of art
and artefacts, both historic and modern to his time.
The unique way he displayed his collection, the
art-filled domestic interiors and the spaces that he already
himself called the ‘museum’ is simply best described as a
Gesamtkunstwerk. The other extraordinary fact -which allows us
today to visit this place- is that Soane bequeathed the house to
the nation on condition that both the house and the collection
would be preserved exactly the way it was arranged at the time of
his death – in perpetuity. (See
www.soane.org
for some further detail.)
My own reflection in a mirror in the Library with Soane
looking at us from Sir Thomas Lawrence's
Portrait of Sir John Soane, aged 76, 1828-29.
What began with a permission to photograph in the museum for one
afternoon (at the time a permission was required) developed into a
major body of work made over the course of several years. In the
process of my regular visits to the museum I also got to know many
staff members and became witness to various aspects of the
everyday running of the museum. This also shifted my awareness
towards the contemporary life of this place, as opposed to seeing
it only as a unique ‘time capsule’.
This amalgamation of
past and present is one aspect I wanted to address with the title
‘Now and Then’, which in addition also refers to the medium of
photography. The preserved interiors can be seen as an
‘object-snapshot’ of their time, hence a contemporary photograph
of these spaces could in theory be a historic photograph.
Initially, I explored various different ways of
photographing from digital 35mm to a pinhole camera. I eventually
decided to juxtapose two photographically distinct approaches:
Photographed with an analogue medium format camera, the
large-format sumptuous, crisp colour images often focus on
reflections and repeat fragmentation as a direct echo of the
spaces, sometimes aided by views that are broken up through
Soane’s theatrical use of real and illusory spaces. Yet, the high
detail images allow for studying intricate details when seen as
large exhibition prints - which on this website can be explored
with the magnifier. The added inclusion of occasional motion blur,
showing the fleeting presence of visitor’s bodies is in contrast
to the stillness of the preserved historic spaces and also
emphasises the contemporary photographic moment.
In contrast, the black and white images photographed with an
analogue 35mm camera on a very light sensitive, grainy film show
tighter crops; 'fast' momentary shots that are even more
fragmented, partial views of visitors on a par with the displayed
object fragments.
To emphasise the moment of the
photographing even further the titles ‘stamp’ a precise time and
date on each image. For exhibition, these titles are fixed to the
frames in the form of classic brass labels. As a collection in
itself, this presents ‘a museum of a museum’ which consciously
extends the hall of mirrors effect that is inherent in all
photographic re-presentation of museum spaces: a self-reflective
mediation of what is already another mediation.
Above all, I would certainly like the images to be seen as a
somewhat poetic homage not only to the uniquely idiosyncratic
Gesamtkunstwerk created by a passionate individual but also to the
fact that successive generations have preserved and visited these
spaces for some 180 years.
Eventually, Now and Then became my own contribution to the
exhibtion series Wundercamera with the initial installation
in the Soane interior of Pitzhanger Manor. This also included the
video work 'Soane Time', also featured on this site. Installation
views can be seen in the documentation
here.
Klaus Wehner, updated: Berlin, August 2021