Anna & Bernhard Blume

“The German artists Anna and Bernhard Blume have been working together for twenty years on what they call ‘a lifelong photo novel’. Extensive series of photography depicts a German petite bourgeois elderly couple in a rather ugly and ordinary home, where nothing is as it should be. The photographs have an absurd humor that everyone who has sighed over the cravings of household chores and the reluctance of things immediately loves. With help of grotesque humor, the images constitute sharp comments on our notions of masculinity, femininity, the home and the family. But Blume’s insane depictions of the hearth of the home, where objects and people never behave as we expect, also open up philosophical questions about the real nature of things and life. The couple’s work with staged photography was an important part of the development that photography underwent during the 80s. Their humor, everyday life and unique way of working with the autobiographical have influenced younger artists of today.”

Translated quote from DN, 2000-04-26, Sara Arrhenius. Read full text in Swedish.