There was someone outside the door. For the tenth time I went to the apartment door and looked through the viewfinder for minutes. I had a steel door and a new lock installed for hundreds of euros. I had called the police twice in one night. Now my knees wobbled and I was firmly convinced that you would introduce gas into the apartment. I told my friends about it the next day and they suggested that I stay with you. I also made an appointment with the psychiatrist. Meanwhile, I suspected harmless subway passengers as spies. I was convinced that if you get terrorized like that you bring help. The psychiatrist listened to my story and prescribed 6 mg risperidion for me. After that it became quieter and foggy. My condition improved. Suddenly there was an emptiness because the photography was stopped by me. What to do? How to fill the day? Looking back at 1999.
The sun blinked and I woke up outside on a park bench. At the end of the subway line I was drunk in cradles and lay down. That was the real my way out of the province in the big advertising world. Outstanding reason, it was desirable for me to protect myself in this world. As part of an internship during my studies, I had it in the strategy department of a large advertising agency in Hamburg. Part of the rights in Hamburg: I had seen myself naked in the fever dream. At night. I have valid rights not to do this delusion in the agency. Half a year earlier I had an MS surge. No related ones were expected, but I was mentally struck. The legs had still decided, I’m still walking. Concerns I ended up in the hospital. There I was flooded with Cordison. Withdraw the contract. In the hospital I get a phone call from a man with whom someone is forever contacts. After REHA, which I broke off. The fate of the other patients is too close to me. My family and friends were close to me and caught me in the situation. The uncertainty was the coming, the coming worst.
Off the beat, but I really wanted to prove myself. At the agency I had a meeting with the agency boss about a project and a presentation to the entire agency. I was under power. Luckily, word got around in 2020 that a lot of work in the advertising world is not so great with low pay. In a ranking of the reputation of occupations, the advertisers came in last.
As a child, I was very involved in the Catholic Church. I was there three times a week. Tuesday as an altar boy in the service, Friday in the children’s choir and service, on Sunday was the big service. When I made my first confession, I opened the door to the confessional and closed it again. I was expecting a chair, but there was none. I liked the staging at the church, I was never really a believer. But the contact with other children and the transcendent did me very good. Well there were exceptions, e.g. when a sister in the late 70s said to us „if you think of the devil you go to hell“. Of course I was in bed in the evening and desperately tried not to think about the devil. What was left of the time? The love for the rituals, for the pathetic for the staging. In 2019 I projected a film triptych Sin-Guilt-Purification in the laundromat in Mannheim with the INDUSTRIETEMEPL.
he visitors to the laundromat passionately discussed the films and the topics. Art can’t look any better. At the end of 2019 I created the film triptych OPFER with the poet and actor Tobias Gelbert. After secondary school, I started an energy electronics apprenticeship at BASF and later completed it. I wasn’t interested in the job. My colleagues came from Pfäzler villages and hunted asylum seekers or drove up the motorway exit with their motorcycles. A trainee had a fighting dog, which he locked in a room and sprayed irritant gas to make the dog more aggressive. Instead, I read SPIEGEL, time and pace. In my overalls was a book by Charles Bukowski, which I read alone in the control room. This daily routine of the workers killed me. I worked two months after that and a colleague was already attuned to the next 40 years. Working was a disaster. We should finish assembly work in a certain time frame. I never succeeded. But it was clear that I only do the two months. At that time there was still beer in the canteen. The beer was cheaper than the water. Coming from a workers‘ household, it was logical for me to complete an apprenticeship at BASF. Back then, my grades weren’t good enough to do my Abitur. At the end of the apprenticeship, the aim was to study.
The visitors to the laundromat passionately discussed the films and the topics. Art can’t look any better. At the end of 2019 I created the film triptych OPFER with the poet and actor Tobias Gelbert. In rowing I was part of the junior national team and there I was one of the few who did an apprenticeship. Everyone else graduated from high school. I wanted that, too. Later, for reasonable reasons, I studied business administration with a focus on marketing communication. A photographer in the advertising course said that I should drop my business studies and study photography. At the beginning of my studies, I went to Sarajevo in 1997 to take photos, later a text with photos appeared in a student magazine of the university. Young and stupid as I was, I forgot to apply for a passport. That meant going to Sarajevo with your ID at your own risk. So I stood at 3am in the morning, in the fog between containers, and with luck I crossed the border. I had already had exhibitions but didn’t dare. During my studies I lived in a shared apartment. The villa was in the middle of the Black Forest, had pointed turrets and I could also reach the university with a walk in the forest. The stay in the province could only be endured because I regularly visited my friends in Cologne and Berlin. After graduation I went to Berlin. There I worked for a short film festival, made programs and got EU funding. I was even invited to Paris with my short film program.
I rebuilt the balance sheet in a way worthy of funding. The bookkeeper of the festival got really dizzy. A short film program with the company of Roman Coppola, the son of Francis Ford Coppola. They had united innovative contractors: music videos – Ninja Tunes & The Directors Bureau. We also had a conversation with Karl Bartos (KRAFTWERK 1975-1990) and sat with him at the bar. A concert event plan failed because he wanted to have an advance.This was followed by a disaster in a media agency. After half a year, you kick me out. I was glad that I could finally sleep again. I had been taking sleeping pills for 6 months. From 2006 to 2010, intensive photography followed. In 2007 I had a very large exhibition. I went out every day to take pictures. In 2009 I started to secure the inside of the apartment door. With chains. Actually, I was only traveling in deserted areas. Drive to Potsdam and then take a bus into the countryside, walked from there. Lonely. At that time I was in the Charlottenburg Palace Park every day. It was good photographically, but emotionally it is not recommended. Back then, social media was just getting going and there were days when I had no contact with anyone. There were also moments of pure happiness, but ambition mixed with isolation led to psychosis in late 2009. I had to wait 5 years until the photography really started again. During this photo-free period I did my 3rd apprenticeship, retraining. IT Specialist. The retraining took place in Brandenburg. „In Brandenburg in Brandenburg somebody was poking against a tree again!“ The participants were all disturbed like me. A participant asked me whether he and his beloved could use my mother’s guest room? He was obese and always sent a cake from her. Another introduced himself as a man with a house and pool. Ultimately, he had such a pool and lived with his mother in the basement. After that I was left alone and artistically followed exhibitions
