Produced on the occasion of the exhibition Jochen Lempert at the Museum Ludwig, Köln, 23 April–13 June, 2010.

Jochen Lempert photographs the animal world in the most diverse contexts: from their natural habitat to the museum of natural history, from the zoo to the urban environment, in remote places or banal settings and situations. Lempert compiles his findings in a vast archive of images covering an ample spectrum, from common everyday views, to compositions that tend towards abstraction. This interest in the natural world as a subject has been further complemented by his exploration of the properties and materiality of the photographic image. Analogue, black and white, hand-printed in the darkroom, his photographs resist categorization and confront the canons of today’s aesthetic.