The eye behind the lens
3 min readby Elena Kroll
Who actually takes our photos? Meet Alexander Steffens, the photographer who writes poetry with light – and hear it straight from him.
What do people or motionless objects look like through the eye of a photographer? How does an everyday situation become a work of art? Can you guess in advance where the next picture will happen? Is photography unplanned order or planned disorder?
For our photos, we rely on two experienced and sensitive eyes. The eyes of Alexander Steffens.
Sensitive and receptive to the atmosphere and the humanity of the faces on the other side of the lens.
They look straight through objects, undress them and make visible what stays invisible to most people: the order of things, their similarities and contrasts, the very being of things.
All of his photos share a common thread, tell a story, find common ground and invite the viewer's gaze to linger for longer than a second.
Extroverted and introverted at the same time, a man of contrasts, with an extremely warm and elegant manner.
Every shoot is spent somewhere between laughing and pondering, and whatever you expected turns out completely different.
Best to give him freedom and room. You won't be disappointed.
A good photo is a photo you look at for longer than a second.
— Henri Cartier-Bresson
Now it's Alex's turn to speak. Artists describe their art best themselves. This is where I say goodbye.
Curtain up.
"A few thoughts on my photography.
The medium of photography moves on an axis all of its own. Even though the moment has been visualised, a photograph is never frozen or still. It exists in the flow of time. As an object, however, it can be taken out of it.
I would like my photography to be the fluid transition between daydream and action. Colourful fabric in the wind, clouds on their travels, moss you walk on barefoot, and senses revealing themselves.
I am a poet WITH the light. Not OF the light.
I see it more as a partnership. This aspect is important. It points to the fact that this trick of the light is surely a sonata to the beauty of everyday life.
A poetic space, even though technically two-dimensional. In this sense, I am searching for an expression that points beyond itself.
This is how we create the missing dimension, so that our thoughts can travel in more than just a straight line. I'm not tied to any particular subject. Anything can be the entrance or the exit to an adventure.
Sometimes I restrict myself conceptually, as with the series "Flags of Berlin", which was created on just a few square metres on Teufelsberg in Berlin. I had been exploring the infinite fold – loosely based on Leibniz and his theory of the Baroque. The result in the series breaks open every restriction I had set and weaves it together with pure sunlight.
The series is documentary (it was shot on film), and yet it has a strongly abstract character.
Often, though, I approach things very freely and openly at first. The theme takes shape while I work. Through the meditative work in the darkroom or during digital editing, the concept condenses afterwards."