Franziska Ostermann

FIRN I from the Body of Work FIRN photographic montages, 2016 Firn is a form of snow that outlasts a defrosting period and increases its density over time. At the act of photographic self-portraiture I am the photographed and the photographer at the same time. I face myself. I am spatially separated from me by the camera. My ego is doubled in space as well as in time - or is it split? I recreate this duality of the trigger-pulling moment in the composition of the images

SELFOBSERVATION I from the body of work SELFOBSERVATIONS Photographic montages, 2019-2020 Never before has the photographic self-portrait been as present as today. With the increasing technical availability of possibilities, it is no longer reserved for a trained elitist group to produce and publish photographs. With the help of the smartphone´s camera, almost everyone in Europe is able to take a selfie and publish it immediately. But where does the need to do so come from? How can the cultural phenomenon be classified? The human is the only living being conscious of itselfs own existence. This awareness is accompanied by the knowledge of the uncertainty of the future and thus the certainty of a loss of control that triggers fear. In order to regain control, the desire for selfassurance manifests itself in reverse. With the increasing mechanization and globalization not only the omnipresence and the variability of the already uncertain future increase. The need for reassurance of the own self manifests itself in the selfie culture. The image suggests „I recognize myself “ and the publication „I recognize myself in the eyes of others“. The often frivolously dismissed narcissistic phenomenon that shapes the generation of the millennials is therefore much more complex than it seems. Selfies are highly media-reflective. The photographers know that they make themselves become an image, and they use it as a communication strategy. By targeting multiple self-containing devices of past-self-duplications on smartphones on to myself, I communicate with versions of myself and allow the otherwise disconnected views to meet in the pictorial space of photography.