ART CITIES:Berlin-Frank Thiel

You may know Frank Thiel through his photographs of the transformation of Berlin from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s. These representations of a city and culture – literally torn down and rebuilt from the ground up – were a huge hit both with city natives and photography critics further afield, and helped cement his reputation for creating huge photographs that went beyond simply awe inspiring and made the viewer really question the transient nature of what was around them.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Blain|Southern Gallery Archive

For his latest body of work, artist Frank Thiel returns to portrait photography for the first time in over 20 years. “Quinceañeras” examines the Cuban tradition of lavish coming-of-age celebrations around a girl’s 15th birthday.  Known for intensively researched projects that document temporary states and places in transformation, Thiel uses the quince tradition as a metaphor for the shifting social and economic climate of Havana – creating a portrait of a generation of young women alongside that of the city itself. Within Spanish based cultures, both genders have a rite of passage during the age of 15. A girl becomes a woman capable of bearing children. A Quinceañera has continued to represent the physical and symbolic passage of a teenage girl into womanhood. Historically, the Quinceañera is important is because long ago, young girls coming of age had essentially two choices: Submit to training in the duties of being a wife and mother, or enter a convent. While in some Catholic families it’s still considered an honor to the family for a son to become a priest or a daughter to become a nun, it’s more common for modern 15-year-olds to celebrate their grand birthday as a coming out party. Thiel is widely renown for photographing the architectural spaces of Berlin, reflecting a turbulent social and political history. Thiel’s monumental works are not merely documentation, but picture a city reborn after a tumultuous history. The architectural spaces in these photographs are not only reflections of a turbulent social and political history, but of the emergence of new patterns of urban existence. Previous bodies of work have focused on such topics as state surveillance and the privatization of public space.

Info: Blain|Southern Gallery, Potsdamer Straße 77–87, (Mercator Höfe), Berlin, Duration: 28/4-16/6/18, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-18:00, www.blainsouthern.com