HIPPOLYTE STUDIO
Kalevankatu 18 B, 00100 Helsinki
09 612 33 44, www.hippolyte.fi
Open: Tue–Fri 12–17, Sat–Sun 12–16, Closed 22.-24.4.2011

1.-29.4.2011
HENDRIK ZEITLER
A Place of One's Own

Discussion Wednesday 13 April, 5 p.m. - Marko Karo, Milla-Kariina Oja & Hendrik Zeitler (discussion on English)

Zeitler´s exhibition and the book, published in spring 2011 by Journal förlag, are about three alternative collective houses in Norway and Sweden: Blitz and Ya Basta in Oslo, and Kvarnis in West Bothnia. The houses are havens for political movements, necessary meeting places where politics are discussed and practised as part of everyday life. In these houses we meet an underlying aesthetic that reflects the lifestyle through fashion and decor. While the resemblance to similar places in other countries is quite strong, these houses are subject to change – slogans and symbols change, the houses are demolished or renovated, people move in and out. While history is present for the residents, it is also elusive. The living memory will disappear in time, and the documentary material will become the only thing left to tell us about the people and the everyday life that general history writing has overlooked.

Through a friend in the animal rights movement, Zeitler got in touch with the Ya Basta house for the first time in 2000. From then on up to the time it was torn down in 2005, he spent much time in the house. Contacts with the other two houses were also established through a mix of political networking and personal friendship. Zeitler saw how quickly those places were changing: Ya Basta was torn down in 2005, Blitz was renovated in 2009 and in Kvarnis rooms were constantly changed by people moving in and out. Zeitler decided to begin documenting the houses. With a large-format camera as his tool, he created a narrative about the aesthetics of these places between the years 2004 and 2009.

Hendrik Zeitler, born in 1975 in Hamm, Germany, got his Master's degree in photography from the School of Photography at the Gothenburg University in 2003. He has had solo exhibitions at the Art Museum Abecita Corsettfabrik, Borås, the Halmstad municipal art gallery, and Sörmlands Museum in Nyköping. He has also participated in group exhibitions at Hasselbladcenter, Kulturhuset Stockholm and the Gothenburg International Biennial for Contemporary Art.

The exhibition is a part of an ongoing Artist-in-Recidence Collaboration between CFF – Center for Photography, Stockholm (Sweden) and Photographic Gallery Hippolyte, Helsinki (Finland).

(c) Hendrik Zeitler

Information and press images:
Hippolyte Studio, +358 9 612 33 44, info[at]hippolyte.fi