Thomas Ruff

THOMAS RUFF (Zell am Harmersbach, Germany, 1958).
"Newspaper Photographs 132". 1990-1991.
Chromogenic color printing.
Edition: 12 + 4 AP.
Mounted in artist's frame.
Signed, dated and numbered on the back.
Measurements: 32,6 x 42,2 cm.

"Newspaper Photographs" arose from a fundamental question Ruff asked himself as a student at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf: How do we process visual information? And how and when does that information become important? Ruff had collected newspaper images since the early 1980s and selected 400 of them for this series. Printed in two columns instead of one, the enlarged photographs are presented without captions or additional context: all that is given is Ruff's selection of the image. By asking viewers to approach the visual information alone, the artist draws attention to the constructed and subjective nature of any photograph.

Thomas Ruff began his career with landscape photography, after which he moved on to photographing interiors and expressionless portraits of his friends, as part of the generation at the center of the political and social changes that occurred with the fall of the Berlin Wall. Between 1977 and 1985 Ruff studied photography at the Academy of Fine Arts in Düsseldorf, along with other photographers, today of recognized prestige, such as Candida Höfer, Andreas Gursky and Thomas Struth, and who are part of the so-called Düsseldorf school, whose parents are Hilla and Bernd Becher. His first portraits are small format and in black and white, but he soon makes the transition to color. In 1986 he began to experiment with large formats. With his series Haus (1987-91) he explores themes beyond portraiture. Other relevant series from this period are Zeitungsfotos (1990-91) or BlaueAugen (1991). During the Gulf War, Ruff uses a night viewfinder to produce gloomy images of the streets of Düsseldorf in his series Nacht (1992-96). In his later works he continues to explore the digital manipulation of images, in this context he executes his series of nudes, the Substrat series (2002-03) and the Machine series (2003). Ruff has had solo exhibitions since 1981 in various international centers and museums. He lives and works in Düsseldorf.