Eighteen Diptychs of Photographic Research—A Laboratory of Photography

Maximilian Gessler, 2021

The eighteen chapters of photographic experiments presented by Maximilian Gessler, which could certainly be expanded on with further chapters, represent basic research that is both poetic and precisely scientific. Balanced between concrete and conceptual photography, the subjects of his images are film material, cameras, and enlargers that engage in precisely calculated interplay with chemical, optical, and technical properties of the medium. Gessler works in his laboratory in the guise of a visual explorer who devises test assemblies, conducts experiments, analyzes, records, and categorizes visual results. “Footnotes” on their numbers, dimensions, frames, and frame color complete his conclusion. The “research results” are published on a website that was created especially for this purpose and a printed catalogue. Behind this work we imagine there is a mind that balances between academic accuracy and the magical realm of images.