Michael Schmidt at Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin

Ein-heit (U-ni-ty) by Michael Schmidt

By Sara Bellini

When I think about the photography of Michael Schmidt, I think of Berlin. I think of his shots of Wedding* and of the Werkstatt für Photographie (Photography Workshop) he founded in Kreuzberg* in the 1970s. But you could argue that what really captures the attention in his photos is not the subject, but the way it’s presented.

Michael Schmidt was a policeman and a self-taught photographer. Some of his first notable works were commissioned by the Berlin Senate or districts of the city, as if the city commissioned him to reflect on itself. If we look at these series, like The Working Woman in Kreuzberg (1975), we see a documentary style, which became more and more abstract over the years.

The exhibition at Hamburger Bahnhof - Museum für Gegenwart is the first retrospective in Michael Schmidt’s native city in over twenty-five years. It encompasses forty years of photography, between 1965 and 2014, and it shows Berlin shifting from the post-war period to division to a re-unified city, tapering out in his last project on nature. Cityscapes, portraits, backyards, human bodies, pigs and apples find their place in the rooms of the station-turned-museum. From Wedding to Kreuzberg, from Waffenruhe (Ceasefire) to Ein-heit (U-ni-ty), from Stadtbilder (Cityscapes) to Lebensmittel (Food), from Frauen (Women) to Selbst (Self) to Natur (Nature), each project and aspect of Michael Schmidt as a photographer is there. And yet he always evades our complete understanding at the last moment, as if our reading of his work was never exhaustive.

Natur (Nature) by Michael Schmidt

I would recommend following the chronological order conceived by the curators to fully appreciate a changing city as well as Michael Schmidt’s evolution as an artist; from black and white to sporadic colour units to pictures of pictures and cropping techniques. From ‘The Wall’, that makes it clear where and when the image belongs, to a close-up on an anonymous wall that could be anywhere. I find it somehow poetic that Michael Schmidt’s final art book, published when he was already seriously ill, focused on the beauty of nature, transcending the urban landscape and ultimately human life itself.

The exhibition will reach first Paris and then Madrid in 2021 and will end in Vienna in 2022. Berliners will be able to see it until January the 17th, wearing a face mask and after buying a time-slot ticket - online or at the venue. Check out the SMB website for up-to-date opening hours and health measures. 

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* Wedding and Kreuzberg are districts of Berlin