Geflutete Kathedralen
Ein einmaliges Dokument von bisher nie gesehenen Räumen
Silvio Marainis Fotografien sind von bestechender Schönheit. Erhabene Tempel, Stützen wie Kirchenpfeiler und ein scheinbar überdimensional grosses Gewölbe. Unwillkürlich fragt man sich als Betrachter, wo man diese 'gefluteten Kathedralen' bestaunen kann. Von aussen verrät ihre Existenz meist nur die Eingangstür zu einem Schacht. Silvio Maraini ist durch diese unscheinbare Tür getreten und hat 'die Denkmäler der Zivilisation' dokumentiert: Wasserbehälter, die sich tief in der Erde verbergen, damit wir kühles Trinkwasser haben. Auf den Bildern fehlt allerdings das Wichtigste, der Zweck dieser Behälter - es fehlt das Wasser. Dadurch eröffnet uns der Fotograf einen Raum, den wir auf diese Weise nie zu sehen bekommen hätten. Benedikt Loderer schreibt in seinem Vorwort: 'Ein Reservoir ist auch ein Geduldsspeicher, hier wird ein Stück Ewigkeit aufbewahrt. Später, nach der nächsten Eiszeit, werden die Archäologen diese noch unversehrten Grabkammern finden und über den Kult rätseln, der hier stattfand.'
Sanatorium Agra: Agra is a small village near Lugano in the southern part of Switzerland. In the first half of th 20th century Agra became famous mostly because of its sanatorium. It was opened 1913 under the name of 'Deutsches Haus Agra' as a sanatory for patients suffering from tuberculosis. Soon it got an excellent reputation and was a place of political and cultural exchange. Famous authors as Erich Kästner and Margarete Steffin, beloved of Bertolt Brecht were patients for several weeks. Photographer Bill Brandt was treated in Agra during the years 1923/1924. Based on his visit in Agra 1927/1928, the swedish author Sven Stolpe wrote his novel called "Waitingroom of the death". Hospital Director Hanns Alexander was a well reputated chief physician. But then he founded a local support group of the german NSDAP and denied access for Jews which polarized the patients and the people of the village. However the swiss government didn't interfere. After the Second World War the reputation of the sanatory was strongly damaged. Due to the antibiotical therapy the number of patients decreased. The hospital closed its doors in 1969. Over years the building decayed to a framework of gigantic extent.
"bagged": More than 50 years ago the renowned insect researcher, animal illustrator and taxidermist Walter Linsenmaier founded the Animal World Panorama in Ebikon near Lucerne, Switzerland. Six years after his death, at the end of 2006, the unique museum was closed. The Natural History Museum of Lucerne has acquired a large number of dated mounted animals from the store of the Linsenmaier collection and therefore suggested to the Linsenmaier family to put the other mounted animals into storage on the premises of the Natural History Museum until a possible resale. To destroy pests such as clothes moths, fur and museum beetles in the feathers and fur of the animals and to avoid introducing them into the existing collection, each mounted animal was individually wrapped up in a plastic bag with mothballs and sealed hermetically. Many of the photographed objects have already been released from the bag and been integrated into the Natural History Museum's collection. To ward off any unnoticed attacks by pests, this collection is also regularly checked. If necessary, individual mounted animals are poisoned once more. The stuffed animals, originally created for a natural environment, have been put in a disposable bag by the scientific taxidermist and been sealed hermetically with coloured tape. Despite the rather hopeless situation, the bag containing poison seems to breathe new life into the animals: The Turtle Dove proudly wears its red collar while the Felinae next to its kitten now seems to even defend its place in the bag. The Cuckoo is trying to escape from the bag and the Snowy Owl has become a bride.The pictures are meant to make your mind wander - also into unusual directions.
The Gotthard Base Tunnel in Switzerland is at the heart of the new transalpine rail route. With a length of 57 km, the world's longest tunnel should become operational at the end of 2017. The images of the series "Gotthard" were done during many visits in the tunnel since 2007 with a Fuji 6x17 cm panorama camera. In February 2010, the average daily advance rate of the tunnel boring machines was 17.6 m. On January 28, 2010, the TBM passed through the transition from Medels granite to Tenelin Zone gneiss without problem. As of April 1, 2010, 95.4 % had been excavated. The whole project will result in two base tunnels under the Gotthard and the Ceneri. Planning and construction of the tunnels extends over a period of approximately 25 years.
In the early 90's the graphite plant of CeCe located in Zuerich, Switzerland was shut down. The almost 40,000 square meter area became the gathering point and relocation venue for a variety of people. This industrial piece of unused land turned into the internationally known "Hall of Fame" for Graffiti sprayers, but also attracted drug users and was sometimes home to gangs. The construction could not withstand the test of time: walls and ceilings came crashing down; plants and mushrooms re-conquered the long lost grounds and fought their way through centimeters of thick layers of graphite. Garbage, rusty paint cans and all kinds of other scrap metal collected in and around the ruins. The fine black and white prints of "Industrial morphosis" (Greek "morphe" as in figure or form, e.g. the shaping of character) intend to take the beholder to its own world, a world between mystical fantasies and the merciless harshness of reality. All images of this series were taken with a 8x10" large format camera.
The difficult times we live in makes it important to rest sometimes. Especially nature becomes a place where our longing for harmony is satisfied. If we take enough time to look at nature we realize how beautiful the world still is. My main objective in landscape photography is to share my love and admiration for nature. The landscape photographs presented here were made with medium and large format cameras. For a couple of years I have almost exclusively used my Phillips Compact II 8x10" camera for landscape photography. This camera, combined with Rodenstock and Schneider lenses, delivers 8x10" negatives of exceptional sharpness and a large tonal range. For the panorama photographs I use a split darkslide to get two 4x10" exposures on one 8x10" sheet. I use Ilford HP5 plus or Adox sheet film, developed in Pyrocat developer. The prints are made with a Durst Laborator enlarger on Forte warmtone fiber base paper. All prints are toned for permanence with selenium toner.
The Workers Series: Despite some technical problems I worked consciously with the available light in order to document the tendency of the workspace. During photographing the features of the workers became more and more proud and confident. It was a challenge to hold these delicately chiselled features. Some pictures obtain rather a melancholic mood, other ones become witnesses of friendship and solidarity. Yet, all hold scenes of the working life of these humans, being parts of an animation only interrupted for seconds. The portraits as well as the older landscape photographs were made with a Hasselblad medium format camera and a Zeiss Planar 80 mm lens. Ilford Delta 100, Delta 400 and occasionally Delta 3200 roll film developed in TMax is used with this equipment.
Ein einmaliges Dokument von bisher nie gesehenen Räumen
Silvio Marainis Fotografien sind von bestechender Schönheit. Erhabene Tempel, Stützen wie Kirchenpfeiler und ein scheinbar überdimensional grosses Gewölbe. Unwillkürlich fragt man sich als Betrachter, wo man diese 'gefluteten Kathedralen' bestaunen kann. Von aussen verrät ihre Existenz meist nur die Eingangstür zu einem Schacht. Silvio Maraini ist durch diese unscheinbare Tür getreten und hat 'die Denkmäler der Zivilisation' dokumentiert: Wasserbehälter, die sich tief in der Erde verbergen, damit wir kühles Trinkwasser haben. Auf den Bildern fehlt allerdings das Wichtigste, der Zweck dieser Behälter - es fehlt das Wasser. Dadurch eröffnet uns der Fotograf einen Raum, den wir auf diese Weise nie zu sehen bekommen hätten. Benedikt Loderer schreibt in seinem Vorwort: 'Ein Reservoir ist auch ein Geduldsspeicher, hier wird ein Stück Ewigkeit aufbewahrt. Später, nach der nächsten Eiszeit, werden die Archäologen diese noch unversehrten Grabkammern finden und über den Kult rätseln, der hier stattfand.'
Sanatorium Agra: Agra is a small village near Lugano in the southern part of Switzerland. In the first half of th 20th century Agra became famous mostly because of its sanatorium. It was opened 1913 under the name of 'Deutsches Haus Agra' as a sanatory for patients suffering from tuberculosis. Soon it got an excellent reputation and was a place of political and cultural exchange. Famous authors as Erich Kästner and Margarete Steffin, beloved of Bertolt Brecht were patients for several weeks. Photographer Bill Brandt was treated in Agra during the years 1923/1924. Based on his visit in Agra 1927/1928, the swedish author Sven Stolpe wrote his novel called "Waitingroom of the death". Hospital Director Hanns Alexander was a well reputated chief physician. But then he founded a local support group of the german NSDAP and denied access for Jews which polarized the patients and the people of the village. However the swiss government didn't interfere. After the Second World War the reputation of the sanatory was strongly damaged. Due to the antibiotical therapy the number of patients decreased. The hospital closed its doors in 1969. Over years the building decayed to a framework of gigantic extent.
"bagged": More than 50 years ago the renowned insect researcher, animal illustrator and taxidermist Walter Linsenmaier founded the Animal World Panorama in Ebikon near Lucerne, Switzerland. Six years after his death, at the end of 2006, the unique museum was closed. The Natural History Museum of Lucerne has acquired a large number of dated mounted animals from the store of the Linsenmaier collection and therefore suggested to the Linsenmaier family to put the other mounted animals into storage on the premises of the Natural History Museum until a possible resale. To destroy pests such as clothes moths, fur and museum beetles in the feathers and fur of the animals and to avoid introducing them into the existing collection, each mounted animal was individually wrapped up in a plastic bag with mothballs and sealed hermetically. Many of the photographed objects have already been released from the bag and been integrated into the Natural History Museum's collection. To ward off any unnoticed attacks by pests, this collection is also regularly checked. If necessary, individual mounted animals are poisoned once more. The stuffed animals, originally created for a natural environment, have been put in a disposable bag by the scientific taxidermist and been sealed hermetically with coloured tape. Despite the rather hopeless situation, the bag containing poison seems to breathe new life into the animals: The Turtle Dove proudly wears its red collar while the Felinae next to its kitten now seems to even defend its place in the bag. The Cuckoo is trying to escape from the bag and the Snowy Owl has become a bride.The pictures are meant to make your mind wander - also into unusual directions.
The Gotthard Base Tunnel in Switzerland is at the heart of the new transalpine rail route. With a length of 57 km, the world's longest tunnel should become operational at the end of 2017. The images of the series "Gotthard" were done during many visits in the tunnel since 2007 with a Fuji 6x17 cm panorama camera. In February 2010, the average daily advance rate of the tunnel boring machines was 17.6 m. On January 28, 2010, the TBM passed through the transition from Medels granite to Tenelin Zone gneiss without problem. As of April 1, 2010, 95.4 % had been excavated. The whole project will result in two base tunnels under the Gotthard and the Ceneri. Planning and construction of the tunnels extends over a period of approximately 25 years.
In the early 90's the graphite plant of CeCe located in Zuerich, Switzerland was shut down. The almost 40,000 square meter area became the gathering point and relocation venue for a variety of people. This industrial piece of unused land turned into the internationally known "Hall of Fame" for Graffiti sprayers, but also attracted drug users and was sometimes home to gangs. The construction could not withstand the test of time: walls and ceilings came crashing down; plants and mushrooms re-conquered the long lost grounds and fought their way through centimeters of thick layers of graphite. Garbage, rusty paint cans and all kinds of other scrap metal collected in and around the ruins. The fine black and white prints of "Industrial morphosis" (Greek "morphe" as in figure or form, e.g. the shaping of character) intend to take the beholder to its own world, a world between mystical fantasies and the merciless harshness of reality. All images of this series were taken with a 8x10" large format camera.
The difficult times we live in makes it important to rest sometimes. Especially nature becomes a place where our longing for harmony is satisfied. If we take enough time to look at nature we realize how beautiful the world still is. My main objective in landscape photography is to share my love and admiration for nature. The landscape photographs presented here were made with medium and large format cameras. For a couple of years I have almost exclusively used my Phillips Compact II 8x10" camera for landscape photography. This camera, combined with Rodenstock and Schneider lenses, delivers 8x10" negatives of exceptional sharpness and a large tonal range. For the panorama photographs I use a split darkslide to get two 4x10" exposures on one 8x10" sheet. I use Ilford HP5 plus or Adox sheet film, developed in Pyrocat developer. The prints are made with a Durst Laborator enlarger on Forte warmtone fiber base paper. All prints are toned for permanence with selenium toner.
The Workers Series: Despite some technical problems I worked consciously with the available light in order to document the tendency of the workspace. During photographing the features of the workers became more and more proud and confident. It was a challenge to hold these delicately chiselled features. Some pictures obtain rather a melancholic mood, other ones become witnesses of friendship and solidarity. Yet, all hold scenes of the working life of these humans, being parts of an animation only interrupted for seconds. The portraits as well as the older landscape photographs were made with a Hasselblad medium format camera and a Zeiss Planar 80 mm lens. Ilford Delta 100, Delta 400 and occasionally Delta 3200 roll film developed in TMax is used with this equipment.
© Silvio Maraini, 2011