philipp von ostau

As everybody knows, the ancient Greeks, whose thought is anything but antiquated,had two gods to symbolize time. One is Cronos, the other Cairos. Cronos is theone eating his children as a symbol for time relentlessly running on, of the presentdissolving the past, unwilling to accept continuity in anything, progress for progress‘sake. Cairos, on the other hand, makes an indentation into one‘s sense of time andsymbolizes the decisive moment, that moment when time stands still and past,present and future are one. Cairos is eternity behind time, or, to speak with WalterBenjamin,further away from God, the shock, the one picture in which insanity and horrorat modernism congeal.Photography borders both on Cronos and Cairos. It tries to capture the picturebehind the pictures, that sudden flash of the myth turning history into nature.Philipp von Ostau, known to me since childhood days, persistently searches for thepictures and stagings which want to hold onto the time behind time. After the fallof the wall Ostau came to Berlin to attend a private academy for media art (Bildo)where, apart from the curriculum itself in TV, photography and video art, classesin Kungfu fascinated him by deepening the passionate break dancer‘s awareness ofthree-dimensionality.His studies of communications, which followed at Berlin University, and first workexperiences at an agency for events confirmed Ostau‘s desire to pursue differentpaths of his own. He wanted to create something lasting. Perhaps unconsciously hefollowed his father‘s track who as a banker in West Germany had tried everythingto regain – with money and still more so through hard work – the estate of his forebearsthought lost: finding a home as an artist, learning an aesthetic, idiosyncraticlanguage of his own was what inspired young Ostau.In the photographs exhibited here Ostau uses his emotional intelligence. He doesnot cramp his audience with reflectiveness nor does he force it to join him in anybrooding. „Springtime for Jack“ is the title of one object. Models are dancing infront of a freezing compartment for corpses with a coffin standing in the background.It looks frivolous especially with red sparkling bubbling up out of a glassto the ceiling and elongating the sweet small red hearts on the tights. In its exaggeratedpose, „Springtime for Jack“ expresses the common thoughtlessness of themodern media world in the face of death. Which crime thriller trembles still at death‘proximity? Nowhere are callous TV detective superintendents in a better moodthan in the forensic pathology department. With „Death, where is your sting?“the photo seems to intone the sound of the time if it were not for those huge feetsticking out of the body compartment – Ostau‘s gimmick.„Take off“ is on Cairos‘ trail. It records the moment some-one is slamming his fistonto the table and everything without a stable place is lifting off. The photocatches the decisive one thousandth of a second when the world‘s aptitude forchange is being uncovered, which causes any act and is its basic idea.Hands and handling, their derivative, are sometimes, though, rather different to adictatorian punch which shakes up conditions. Hands reach for the world, aredoers, they muddle through, are restless, serve and do the handicrafts.A photo of a DJ carries the title „Tresor“ („Berlin techno Club“). A long exposure and a flashlightrestricted to a narrow strip create a haptic ghost-train scenery. The camerapresented Ostau, so to speak, with a miracle: In the course of the photographicsequences the background colour changed to an overwhelming blue, a contrast tohectic rush.Ostau‘s approach to the picture behind the pictures is unemotional and precise.„Ufo“ is the title given to a composition which appears to reverse the relationshipbetween the worldly and otherworldly in the sense of what is really to beexpected. The unidentified flying object is depicted with the greatest accuracy,but the real sea of houses is shown blurred. People who have seen „High noon“with Gary Cooper will remember the magnificent scene where the gangsters hangaround the station – a suspended moment before the showdown. Ostau‘s „Highnoon“ refers to this interregnum between tension and release. The models simulatecasualness and condescension. Usually killing for a photographer, the high sunbeats down flatly onto the scene. Here the invisible captivates, the state of beingcovered-up of the mythical archetype of film-making. Cronos has won and pushedpictures over the prototype scene. They never come back, these fantastic Hollywoodheroes. The distance is enmeshed in wire.And then there is a burning chair– to me the best photo from Ostau‘s search for themythical pictures behind the surface. The photo lives from the shock of the deathlyfire turning a comfortable piece of furniture for sitting on into an instrument oftorture.Not only the „Electric chair“ of the title springs to mind, but also the throne ofAlmighty God. The picture is sublime in the classical sense. It creates an atmosphereinstead of illustrating one. It belongs to something strange that exists in afantasy world of rules unknown to us.In the artistic sense, Philipp von Ostau‘s photos are the pictures behind the pictures.
Nikolaus v. Festenberg, DER SPIEGEL
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