The determing element in Michael Koch’s photographic work is transformation. Private individuals change into role models who mingle with art historical and mass media patterns. This combination with private and public elements in pictures bother a kind of a psychological suspence opening the direction of motives of desire.
These “archetype role models” from dandy to diva, from hero to failure – refer to the personality of the performer which Koch examines in the process of explanation. The landscape motives in his pictures which are combined with the role portraits and object stills in a dialogue have the same topic. The real existing place or thing is not the subject, rather the section of landscape as scenes and projection fields.
His pictures often evoke a certain distance. Insects, stuffed animals, withered flowers, skin, disguised people – the uncanny and inherent beauty are all part of Koch`s reality. He is showing a construction of reality that thoroughly allows to tell beautiful lies.
Michael Koch – born in Braunschweig, lives and works in Düsseldorf, Germany.
