This describes a steady forward movement despite phases of regression. This means progress, development and change, and at the same time consistency. It remains open where the destinations of the narratives in Levin Oehler’s works lie. Instead, working processes involving living and dead matter become the focus of attention: transformed bodies and natural and man-made structures engage in a dialogue. Cavities in timber communicate with their positive counterparts. Grain inscribed into the wood seeks its equal in the lifelines of a human hand. Hollowed out, cut up or turned upside down are the subjects which appear sorted and orderly in the photographs. One of the central themes in the artist’s work is the point of transition between documentation and intervention. In addition to questions about the objects and activities captured in each image, a curiosity about artistic interference arises: When am I actually making art?

When we look at the black-and-white prints, which vary in form and format, our gaze lingers on the familiar everyday objects, now depicted with the utmost precision. We embark on a search for continuities and comparisons and find what we are looking for especially in those photographs that are arranged in duos or series. In doing so, we notice that, on the one hand, the individual image is only a fragmentary section of a larger whole and, on the other hand, that each motif also exists in and for itself. Having grown tired of the purely depictive function of photography, Oehler opens the medium and seeks the connection with sculptural elements. The observation of work processes becomes artistic work. Its traces are portrayed in a simple and honest way. Nevertheless, the resulting photographs exhibit points of creative friction, for example, through variations of one and the same pictorial object. Their effect unfolds in the exhibition space in a quiet, approachable and balanced, yet not fully transparent way. „I want to show something, to draw attention to overlooked things, and not perform a kind of sorcery,“ explains the artist.

Work = force x distance. Levin Oehler wants this simple equation to be expanded by the components of man and matter. Thus, in front of his photographs, we take two steps forward and one step back, we are constantly in motion. Therefrom, we gain completely new relations to the things we know and as a result orient ourselves in our role as an observer; we locate the focus of our own perception.

Levin Oehler studied after his education in photography, he studied communication design in Hamburg and Hanover, followed by studies of art in the class „Photography in the Field of Contemporary Art“ with Peter Piller at the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig. In the past year, he completed his diploma in fine arts in the sculpture class of Tamara Grcic at Kunsthochschule Mainz. Oehler has exhibited at Kunstverein Jesteburg, Kunstraum Ortloff Leipzig and Kestner Gesellschaft in Hanover, among others. He lives and works in Frankfurt am Main.

Text: Michelle Heyer