Concrete and Generative Photography 1960–2014

Part 1: The Pioneers

Kilian Breier, Pierre Cordier, Herbert W. Franke, Hein Gravenhorst, Heinz Hajek-Halke, Karl-Martin Holzhäuser, Roger Humbert, Gottfried Jäger, René Mächler

The term ‘concrete’ describes a movement in photography that deliberately avoids representing outside objects in order to focus exclusively on the intrinsic laws of the photographic image. It makes itself the subject: light, materials unique to photography, its generative processes, the camera. The resulting images are pictures of pure light, photographs of photography, a visual genre all its own. With all the developments it has undergone over the 20th century, concrete photography appears alongside corresponding artistic phenomena such as concrete painting, concrete poetry, and concrete music.
In 1968, Gottfried Jäger introduced the term ‘generative photography’ to describe an artistic program that uses methods of concrete photography, but follows the style of constructive design, producing images that are methodical, systematic, and serial. The exhibition shows early examples of this genre with vintage prints and originals from the 1960s, as well as more recent developments that implement newer photographic technology.