Portfolio: Picture Library

Abstract

Joachim Schmid (1955) is a German, Berlin based artist working with found-photography since the 1980s. His artistic practice with vernacular photography stands by the conceptual moto no new pictures until the old ones are used up. This premise defined his practice and is the framework of his observation on mass culture and photography collective production. His work explores the patterns and visual languages of vernacular imagery through time, outside the purposes of scientific or artistic contexts, thus making Schmid a pioneer of this artistic approach. With the advent of the digital age, his works have shifted towards internet culture and social media production in a global context. 

In parallel with his artistic practice, Schmid is also a photography critic, essayist and editor who has published over one hundred artist books. His works have been presented worldwide in solo and group exhibitions and can be found in prestigious art collections, such as the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Paris), the Daelim Contemporary Art Museum (Seoul), the Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam), the Maison Européenne de la Photographie (Paris), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Pitt Rivers Museum (Oxford).

The work Picture Library, featured in this issue of Archivo Papers Journal, is a sequel to Other People’s Photographs (2008-2011). Both series draw on the same source, but while the earlier one explores recurring patterns in everyday photography, the latter focuses on individual particularities and obsessions, highlighting various inventories of people’s lives and environments.