Jochen Lempert

The work of Jochen Lempert (Germany, 1958) engages with photography from the optic of research and visuality, very often with the intention of questioning the criteria behind a search for the truth and the models that shape the world. The artist portrays the animal world in the most varied contexts: ranging from the natural habitat to Natural History museums, from the zoo to the city, in remote locations or in banal situations and objects. In his tireless quest, Lempert has managed to create a vast archive of images that covers a wide spectrum spanning everything from everyday views to compositions that tend more towards abstraction.
This interest in the natural world as subject matter is coupled with an exhaustive examination of the properties and materiality of the photographic image. Analogue, in black and white, and developed in the darkroom, his photos refuse to be categorised and are removed from contemporary aesthetic canons.