Edith Held
Edith Held is a photographer who tells layered stories through her conceptual works, infused with subtle humor and a profound curiosity about the world. This distinctive combination defines her rich and multifaceted oeuvre. Her images captivate, linger in the mind, and invite viewers into an open dialogue where anything seems possible. „What if…?“ and „What else might be hidden beneath the surface?“ are the questions her photographs appear to ask, encouraging us to discover our own answers. Yet, in the end, one final secret always remains. It is precisely this unresolved mystery that gives her work its compelling power: concealed perspectives emerge, and the seemingly impossible suddenly becomes imaginable. Held’s photographs make us smile, sometimes even laugh, while transporting us into worlds of dreams, fantasy, wonder, and contemplation. In her universe, nothing is quite as it seems. Edith Held possesses the rare gift of revealing exactly that.
Isobel Markus
Edith Held ist Fotografin und erzählt in ihren konzeptuellen Arbeiten hintergründige Geschichten reich an feinsinnigem Humor und Neugier auf die Welt. Eine Mischung, die als Schlüssel ihrer intensiven und vielseitigen Werke dient. Die Bilder sprechen an, lassen nicht mehr los und fordern uns zum Dialog auf. Dabei könnte alles möglich sein. „Was wäre, wenn …?“ und „Was verbirgt sich vielleicht noch dahinter?“ scheinen ihre Fotografien zu fragen, und geben uns damit die Möglichkeit, eigene Antworten zu finden. Und doch bleibt am Ende ein allerletztes Geheimnis. So entsteht eine starke Anziehungskraft: Versteckte Perspektiven werden aufgezeigt, Undenkbares plötzlich für möglich gehalten. Helds Fotografien lassen lächeln, sogar lachen, und versetzen uns in ihre Träume und Fantasien sowie in einen staunenden, aber auch nachdenklichen Zustand. Denn auf der Welt ist nichts, wie es scheint. Edith Held besitzt die Gabe, es uns aufzuzeigen.
Isobel Markus
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Contrasts and tensions, different perspectives and points of view in dynamic interplay.
APRIL.BERLIN presents
a Duo-Exhibiton
‚Horizonte‘
Peter Ruehle und Edith Held.
For her portrait series Oneshot, photographer Edith Held embraces the deliberate limitation of opportunity: each portrait is created using just a single roll of analogue film containing ten exposures. This self-imposed constraint places both photographer and sitter under a unique kind of tension, making every frame count.
By contrast, Nina Mae Fowler bases her drawn portraits on source material such as press photographs that capture world-famous actors in singular moments—striking poses that perhaps only actors can summon on demand.
In both cases, the result is a series of extraordinary portraits of remarkable intensity: at times solemn, at times tragic, and often infused with wit and irony.
The works portray personalities including Sidney Poitier, Audrey Hepburn, Shirley MacLaine, Iris Berben, Detlev Buck, Ulrike Folkerts, and Charly Hübner.
All drawings and photographs will be presented to the public for the first time in our exhibition The One Moment. We would be delighted if you could join us for this premiere at the opening reception on Thursday, September 21, 2023, from 6:00 p.m.
On July 8, 1947, the Roswell Daily Record ran the headline: “RAAF Captures Flying Saucer on Ranch in Roswell Region.” On the Foster Ranch, approximately 120 kilometers northwest of Roswell, rancher W. W. “Mac” Brazel discovered mysterious pieces of debris. He immediately notified the Chaves County Sheriff’s Office. Major Jesse Marcel, stationed with the U.S. Army in Roswell, was assigned to examine the debris on the ranch. News quickly spread around the world that the recovered material was the wreckage of an unidentified flying object. Only a few hours later, however, the U.S. Army press office in Fort Worth retracted the report, stating that the debris was merely the remains of a radar reflector from a crashed U.S. Air Force weather balloon. The Roswell incident was declared a classified government project. Confidential! Witnesses were silenced, reports were falsified, and evidence was replaced or manipulated. More than seventy years later, the Roswell UFO crash remains a living myth—and since May 2018, more relevant than ever.In the previous year, Berlin photographer Edith Held traveled through the American South. There, she encountered unidentified flying objects and beings that could not possibly have come from Earth.In an interview with the Alien Daily on April 18, 2019, she declared: “It is the truth. I saw them!” The evidence is overwhelming.
Am 18. April 2019 bekräftigte sie in einem Interview mit der Alien Daily: „It is the truth. I saw them!”
The Silence After the Crash
Fourteen works depict bizarre automobile accidents. An uncanny sense of tension hangs over these scenes—surreal in appearance, either eerily deserted or crowded with onlookers. What is happening here? How could this have happened? Why is the car embedded in the wall of a house? Alongside the obvious questions about the circumstances of each accident, viewers are left with doubt, curiosity, and amused wonder. Can what I’m seeing really be true? The photographs themselves seem to insist that it is. Every image invites close and careful scrutiny of its countless details. As viewers complete their own detective work, they are likely to move on to the next photograph with a smile, amused by the absurdity of the scene—and with the realization that nothing is quite as it seems.
Two Artistic Mediums in Dialogue
Two artistic mediums enter into dialogue, exploring the dynamic relationship between photography and painting. Light and canvas come together as a unified whole. Both artists are committed to looking back with curiosity and openness, giving renewed attention to their retrospective works in order to create something new. Together, they bring works from earlier phases of their artistic practice into the present, transforming them through thoughtful and imaginative synthesis. In doing so, they create new works that bridge past and present.
Zwei Kunstgattungen im Dialog
Zwei Kunstgattungen treffen sich im Dialog, eine wechselvolle Beziehung zwischen Fotografie und Malerei – Licht und Leinwand ergänzen sich zu einer Einheit. Der Retrospektive besondere Beachtung zu schenken, ihr mit Neugierde und Aufgeschlossenheit zu begegnen und dadurch etwas Neues zu kreieren, ist das Anliegen beider Künstlerinnen. Gemeinsam Werke vergangener Schaffenszyklen hervorbringen ins Hier und Jetzt, und durch kunstvolle Synthesen etwas Neues entstehen lassen.
More than one hundred children living in refugee shelters across Berlin were photographed for the project NEW WORLD. Each child tells their own story in their own words. Their stories speak of home, family, flight, and the search for a new place to belong. They share their worries, their joys, their fears, and their dreams—along with the things left unsaid or too difficult to express. Coming from different countries and cultures, these children have arrived in a NEW WORLD. The photographic project NEW WORLD has been developed since September 2014 through a collaboration between Gunter Haedke, founder of galerie auf zeit, and photographer Edith Held.
Über 100 Kinder aus Berliner Flüchtlingswohnheimen wurden für das Fotoprojekt „NEUE WELT“ porträtiert. Alle Kinder erzählen ihre Geschichte in eigenen Worten. Sie handeln von Heimat, Familie, Flucht, einem neuen Zuhause. Die Kinder erzählen von ihren Sorgen, ihren Freuden, ihren Ängsten und ihren Träumen, von Nichtgesagtem oder Unsagbarem. Die Kinder, aus unterschiedlichen Ländern und Kulturen, sind angekommen in einer „NEUEN WELT“. In Zusammenarbeit mit Gunter Haedke, Initiator der „galerie auf zeit“, und der Fotografin Edith Held entstand das Fotoprojekt „NEUE WELT“ seit September 2014.
NEWS | PERSONAL PROJECTS | PEOPLE | EXHIBITIONS | oneshot.rocks
NEWS | PERSONAL PROJECTS | PEOPLE | EXHIBITIONS | oneshot.rocks
NEWS | PERSONAL PROJECTS | PEOPLE | EXHIBITIONS | oneshot.rocks
