Sturm / Iconoclasm

In an iconoclastic move the entire slide archive of Cologne University's Institute of Art History is strewn about the floor — c. 200.000 photographic reproductions of artworks representing over 2.000 years of cultural history. The slides have been both the subject and supporting material for many lectures since the 1950s. They were made at the request of lecturers and students alike by the institute's photographers, then properly labeled by assistants and filed into cabinets to be lent out for lectures and presentations. The slides have served their time as teaching aids; they have been replaced by digital image formats and projection technology. Physically, the slides remain intact, but emptying the files is an irreversible act that renders the image archive unusable in a traditional sense. In turn the archive's content becomes fully visible for the first time.

200.000 35 mm slides, former slide archive of Cologne University’s Institute of Art History, 900 x 1600 cm, Museum Wiesbaden, 2013