Scientists are happy people.
At least that's how they look in Herlinde Koelbl's black and white photos.
The photographer was modeled on immunologists, biochemists, microbiologists, marine researchers and whatever else there is in the way of specialists whose fields of activity the average citizen may have heard of but don't understand in the slightest.
And everyone has a smile, a smile, such an open, relaxed and, above all, free expression on their face that one can only envy them for what they do.
Koelbl is known for sensitive portrait studies.
The long-term observation “The Traces of Power”, which documents how the burden of office changes the expressions of politicians like Gerhard Schröder, Joschka Fischer or Angela Merkel, is associated with its name.
For her latest project “Fascination Science” Koelbl was - even before Corona - five years on the road to see 60 pioneering researchers around the world, whom she interviewed and photographed at their respective places of work.
After the kick-off exhibition in 2020 in the Berlin Academy of Sciences, the Kunsthalle Wiesbaden is now presenting the results for the first time in a museum context.
Expressive gestures in contrast to the calm appearance
The researchers don't just show the photographer their face. In addition to their most important work tool, the head, they also embody their subject with their hands, whose often expressive gestures form a contrast to the otherwise calm appearance of the portrayed. On the inner surfaces, they have put their actions into an atypically subjective formula with a black felt pen. The American chemist Richard Zare, for example, whose hands spread out in front of his chest like the wings of a bird, symbolizes the doubt that is essential for academic success with two question marks in a refreshingly clear manner. His Israeli colleague David Avnir, however, asks his hand raised as if in a gesture of blessing: “Go wild” and thereby corrects the image of supposedly remote research. The Kenyan,Immunologist Faith Osier, who teaches in Heidelberg, on the other hand formulates the serious issue of “Make Malaria History”, while marine researcher Antje Boetius reveals her drawing potential with a two-master circled by Fischlein and biologist Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard holds out a curve diagram to the viewer.
The impression that science does not take place in an ivory tower is supported by anonymous quotes such as “Let failure lead you to success” or “The idea of 'Eureka' is rather unromantic. Research is similar to climbing Mount Everest ”. The wall texts loosen up the series of pictures that line the L-shaped exhibition space, while five flags hanging in the middle of the ceiling turn it into an installation. On the front and back of these large formats you can see the likenesses of Nobel Prize winners or employees of the Max Planck Society, which operates as a cooperation partner of the show.
The fact that science is, on the one hand, something very fair, because it obviously does not differentiate according to age, gender or skin color, becomes just as evident as a great injustice: namely that immense individual achievements are disproportionate to a generally low level of awareness among the general public. Koelbl's recordings give science a face. You can see their interviews on several screens in the foyer of the Kunsthalle. You confirm once again that research has a lot to do with passion. Above all, however, the detailed and sensitive discussions are probably the key to the fact that the scientists in front of Koelbl's camera have opened up in such a way.
The exhibition “Herlinde Koelbl. Fascination Science ”in the Kunsthalle Wiesbaden, Schulberg 10, is open until October 31 on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays to Sundays from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Thursdays from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.