My Body - Foreign Self. The Teutloff Collection in the Exhibition THAT'S ME

The photographs in the exhibition "That's me" show bodies in action rather than photographic self-portraits. They appear as images of something unknown and mysterious; in order to know whether we experience this foreign aspect as a fiction of our own or estranged selves, we must try to see these pictures with our own eyes.
In Cindy Sherman's figures her own persona presents a never-ending masquerade. Her characters verge between profound introspection ("I cannot imagine that I am ever completely myself") and a feel for the visual power of ambivalence. Like practically no other artist of her generation, Cindy Sherman has created a multifaceted parallel universe in which one person continues to circulate in new formats. "I am many but always slightly different" appears to be her work ethos. While Jürgen Klauke indulges in his passion for self-aggrandisement by incorporating many different utensils in a fetishlike way, Rudolf Schwarzkogler's action photos document the powerful urge to portray the human body as a shocking medium between self-exposure and martyrdom. Valie Export and Elke Krystufek explore the divide between political and feminist provocation, and the realisation that the body invariably represents the opposite of male projections - the self is a social fiction which occurs on the battlefield of the body. Martin Liebscher ironically toys with the aspect of the brilliant and exalted artistic persona. The photographer appears in an endless row of identically reproduced figures in action. "Many are also just one me" seems to be his message - even if it is no more than a figment of the artist's imagination designed to mock the art world. Finally, Christopher Makos obliterates the belief in a seemingly unique self by combining Andy Warhol's mask-like and artificial photo image with his oscillating gender transformations. In this way, he undermines all notions of verified identity. Where am I when I encounter myself in a picture? The photographic pictures of the Teutloff Collection provide answers to this question.… .

Dr. Michael Kröger, MARTa Herford