Timm Rautert

Drawing on his experience as a photojournalist, Timm Rautert uses photography as a means to investigate social issues. He focuses especially on conditions of labour, changes in technology and production in the second half of the 20^th century, and anonymous or marginalized groups of people. The camera is kept at a distance from its subjects, in order to rid the photograph of subjectivity and artistic autonomy. Rautert also explores his environments in series. In Rautert’s ‘Porsche’ series, objects take up just as important a role as human characters. Black and white images of men at work in a production hall at the Porsche factory in Stuttgart in 1968 convey the changes in modern society towards indiscernible and specialized work patterns. The ‘Porsche’ series is continued in 2006 as Rautert returns to the same factory, this time photographing in pale colours, creating a beautiful yet uncanny atmosphere of how human labour is now almost entirely superfluous.