Roger Melis
06 Mar - 02 May 2010
ROGER MELIS
"Chronicler and flaneur" - Retrospective
06.03 to 02.05.10
Opening . 05.03.10 . 7pm
“Roger Melis understood how to wait until the gaze shifted into the distance and the person became visible, self-contained, revealing himself.” Christoph Hein
Roger Melis was a chronicler and a precise observer of life in the world of East Germany: crumbling facades and rainsoaked cobblestone streets, confident workers, silent, mistrustful farmers, teenagers at the fair, coal delivery men on their cigarette break, pigeons keeping watch, daydreaming children, melancholy poets, and provocative artists. He was capable of reading his surroundings in detail, beyond the propaganda and state-run photojournalism.
C/O Berlin honors the late Roger Melis, who passed away in Fall 2009, with the first retrospective of his work in his hometown, Berlin. The exhibition includes approximately 200 photographs focusing on his work in the GDR, urban portraits from Paris and London, and documentary photos from Moscow and Poland in the 1960s that have never before been shown.
"Chronicler and flaneur" - Retrospective
06.03 to 02.05.10
Opening . 05.03.10 . 7pm
“Roger Melis understood how to wait until the gaze shifted into the distance and the person became visible, self-contained, revealing himself.” Christoph Hein
Roger Melis was a chronicler and a precise observer of life in the world of East Germany: crumbling facades and rainsoaked cobblestone streets, confident workers, silent, mistrustful farmers, teenagers at the fair, coal delivery men on their cigarette break, pigeons keeping watch, daydreaming children, melancholy poets, and provocative artists. He was capable of reading his surroundings in detail, beyond the propaganda and state-run photojournalism.
C/O Berlin honors the late Roger Melis, who passed away in Fall 2009, with the first retrospective of his work in his hometown, Berlin. The exhibition includes approximately 200 photographs focusing on his work in the GDR, urban portraits from Paris and London, and documentary photos from Moscow and Poland in the 1960s that have never before been shown.