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WIR

english title: ›We - Dramaturgy of Social Life‹
work in progress, since 2005 i.e. since the beginning
of my artistic activity

It is always us. A horse, lying in a strange green landscape in an odd way. Thousands of people, their faces as small as pinheads, packed into a stadium stand in an anonymous pattern. A group of tourists on a small strip of beach, caught between a guileless sea and a skyless background.
It is always us. In this body of work the artist exclusively depicts scenes fully laden with human traces. That way he points to us and to himself. The traces equal fingerprints of being. Almost every detail in the photographs is ar- ranged, arranged by life itself, not by the artist.

This is exactly where the point is being made: the ostensible randomness of the scene diminishes and gives way to the dramaturgy of social life.

The almost trivial look- ing image of everyday life opens up in a reflexive space, the WIR-space. With deeper observation, the works develop its certain WIR-quality.
The quiet and restrained way the camera is handled, the great richness of detail, the high technical quality of the images as well as a very precise view the artist introduces are the stylistic devices, with which he takes our social fingerprints.

WIR Strand

About the Series

WIR is an important core in the artist's oeuvre.

In his early years from 2005 onwards
Otto Hainzl developed in this body of work
essential basic ideas for his subsequent series.

'WIR - Dramaturgy of Social Life' can be understood as a table of contents for the works that follow, e.g. ›Hotels I Know‹, corviale or even Europastrasse.

Das Konzept Menschenleerer Menschenbilder ist 2008 bei der Konzeptionierung einer WIR Ausstellung, damals noch unter dem Titel ›Begegnung‹, entstanden.

The concept people-images without people was developed in 2008 during the conceptualization of a WIR exhibition, then still entitled ›Encounter‹.

Exhibitions

→ ›Menschenbilder‹ (Forerunnner of WIR) Minoriten Wels (A), 2006
→ ›WIR - Dramaturgy of Social Life‹ Galerie Halle, Linz (A), 2008
→ ›WIR - Dramaturgy of Social Life‹ Galerie foto-forum Bozen (I), 2010
→ ›WIR - Dramaturgy of Social Life‹ European Month of Photography - “eyes on”, Vienna (A), 2010
→ ›WIR und andere Arbeiten‹ - “Kunst im Schloss”, solo, Puchenau (A), 2016