CANDIDA HÖFER

Overview

Ben Brown Fine Arts is proud to present an exhibition of photographs by Candida Höfer. Taken in both public and private places, she focuses on the interiors of spaces, centers of power, commerce and the institution. The photographs depict a world of knowledge and exchange of information. This exhibition presents the cultural institutions of Portugal and the Louvre museum. Although she has photographed cultural institutions internationally, Höfer does not set out to make art about colonialism, globalization or social disparities, "To highlight social function is not my concern". She has created a collection of work where her intervention highlights the unspoken glory of her subjects. Höfer exposes the sublimity of the relationship between humanity, space and architecture and the endless possibilities of photography.

Höfer's upbringing introduced her to the concept of a 'set'; spaces that were built purposefully as back drops for human action. Growing up in post war Germany, which must in itself have seemed like a landscape in renovation, she observed that specific choices were made about history and culture. A commentary of this was being built into new architectural sculptures and public spaces, for someone of Höfer's generation they could appear as 'sets' for a new attempt of social life.