Picture books that move: Dayanita Singh's retrospective "Dancing with my Camera"

Created: 11/22/2022, 2:06 p.m

By: Lara Listl

Museums in the museum: Singh's self-built wooden constructions, dubbed "museums", fit perfectly into the rooms of Villa Stuck.

© Dayanita Singh/Jann Averwerser

The Villa Stuck shows the most extensive retrospective of the Indian photographer Dayanita Singh to date.

A traveling exhibition that is worth more than just a visit.

Because in the course of time some pictures are exchanged.

A photographer pushing the boundaries of her medium.

That overcomes the static capture of a moment and sets images in motion.

A bookmaker who creates jackets in which the wearer becomes the museum himself.

And builds wooden constructions that are picture frames, displays, archives and furnishings all in one.

This is Dayanita Singh.

The Indian photographer who received the Hasselblad Foundation Award this year – the world's most important prize in photography – and whose most extensive retrospective to date can now be seen at Villa Stuck.

A traveling exhibition entitled "Dancing with my Camera" that is worth more than just a visit.

Currently on display at Villa Stuck: the most comprehensive retrospective of Dayanita Singh to date

Because with the constructions she built herself from teak and called "museums", she created multi-part picture frames in which her individual black-and-white photographs can be rearranged and exchanged again and again.

The hinges between the heavy wooden struts are too fragile, but the curators Helena Pereña, Sabine Schmid and Stephanie Rosenthal will announce dates during the course of the exhibition when some of Singh's pictures will be replaced.

Women are always at the center of Dayanita Singh's photographic art.

© Dayanita Singh/Jann Averwerser

Born in New Delhi in 1961 as the daughter of an amateur photographer, Singh was enthusiastic about the medium of photography at an early age.

There are also pictures of her as a child, taken by her mother, who encouraged her to become a professional photographer.

For 40 years, Singh has been photographing motifs related to Indian music, friendship, archives, architecture, cinema, social changes and gender roles.

But she is never concerned with the individual picture, but with the relationships between the photographs.

Singh's "museums" are picture frames, displays, archives and furnishings all in one

She sees herself as a bookmaker who works with photographs.

Initially, she created book projects in which her images remain in motion as the pages are turned and can be carried through space and time as mobile objects.

Museums soon took notice of the artist, and Singh developed new formats to continue presenting her work as mobile as in a book, but now also suitable for exhibition spaces.

Among other things, this has resulted in their unique “museums”.

The inside serves as a photo archive so that the pictures showing to the outside can be exchanged at any time.

Depending on how the wooden constructions are opened, moved or closed, they sometimes appear as a room divider, sometimes as a cupboard or as a complete furnishing corner with a bed, desk, stool and storage elements.

Surrounded by portraits of women by Franz von Stuck is Singh's "Little Ladys Museum"

Singh also refers to the exhibition locations.

Her "Little Ladys Museum", for example, which shows photographs of girls and young women, is located in the historic rooms of the villa, surrounded by portraits of women by the painter and sculptor Franz von Stuck.

also read

ARD "crime scene" from Dresden: does Commissioner Schnabel die?

Munich: The somewhat different sex shop opens on Maximilianstrasse

In addition to her leporello and book formats, her architectural collages are also special, in which she draws from her large archive and cuts out sections of photographs into another image.

A game with the viewer, who sometimes has to look very closely in order to recognize the second photo in the fantasy buildings that appear realistic at first glance.

Visitors to the exhibition will receive free posters with the latest works by Dayanita Singh

Every visitor can take home an artwork by Singh as a gift: a poster that provides detailed information about the art and the artist on the one hand and photographs of her recently published work "Let's see" on the other.

The exhibition in the Villa Stuck is open Tuesday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. until March 19.