In my concept “ice landscape translated into the medium of photography” I experimented with controlled random processes in combination with photography.

The aim was to visualize an imaginative, plant-like, crystalline winter landscape and to photograph details that result in new landscapes. On the one hand, to translate the painting and drawing procedures into another medium, on the other hand as an allusion to the micro- and macrocosm of the ice crystals.

The ice landscapes photographed from the work are all very different and each stand for themselves as an independent landscape (microcosm), but at the same time they are a single large landscape (macrocosm). It was also about expressing the diversity and complexity that a single work can have.

At first it was important to me to capture the magical character of snow crystals. Wet-on-wet painting was ideal for this, whereby I attached an important role to the random process in my work. In order to emphasize certain elements, it made sense to refer to the drawing. Since chance, as the saying goes, “does what it wants“, the implementation turned out to be more difficult than hoped. Even if it was about a controllable coincidence, it was not foreseeable whether the desired crystalline gradient effect would occur or not. Experimenting with the random method requires a lot of attempts.

The advantage of random processes is that it makes it easier to iget started with painting and drawing. The randomly emerging shapes on the background of the picture will provide a direction in which one can go. This means that the problem of disorientation is lifted on the initially empty picture surface. I was also impressed by this process because of its sometimes unpredictable effects, which stimulate new ideas and thus the work process. The aspects of freedom and spontaneity, which the chance procedure implies and which give the works an authentic expression, have also moved me to adopt this method for myself.

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