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Antje Peters
Photographer

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Copyright 2023
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This website is a digital archive and therefore always under construction.
For a digital portfolio (pdf) please email to info@antjepeters.com.

ARTIST STATEMENTS :

Antje Peters was born in West-Berlin, Germany. In 2000, she moved to The Netherlands to study Photography at the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten in Utrecht. 2016 she returned to her hometown where she is currently based. Peters works as an artist with the medium photography and as a commercial photographer. She contributes to international print-magazines like Numéro Berlin, Wallpaper*, Die Dame, ZEIT Magazin, Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin, Alla Carta or Baron Magazine and and has shot campaigns for Rimowa, Birkenstock, Louis Vuitton, Farfetch, HUGO and Glossier.

Her personal work has been shown at C/O Berlin, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam and materialised into various artist books sold at international art book fairs like Off Print Paris and NYABF. Her latest book ‘Catalogue’ was shortlisted for the Book Award at Les Rencontres d'Arles, France in 2023. 'I take the existing stereotype of the medium of photography as its focus. Photography of the product becomes the subject within my work itself. Well known visual strategies of the advertising world are analysed and broken down with an artistic approach. Art as well as commercial photography change and influence each other.’

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As an artist working with photography, my work starts from the notion of the current omnipresence of photographic imagery in both 'high' and 'low' cultures. I take the existing stereotype of the medium photography as it’s focus.
In an attempt to get a grip on the never-ending production and dissemination of photographic imagery, at my final year at art school I started a project, 'The Free Catalogue' (working title). I was deeply inspired by the work of German photographer August Sander (1876-1964) and his way of creating a catalogue of archetypes, as demonstrated in his magnum opus Menschen des 20. Jahrhunderts (People of the 20th Century).
My initial confusion about the contemporary nearly never-ending ‘stream of images’, was given ground by Sanders' way of categorization. By means of my self-created archive of photographs, I try to funnel my experience and perception of mainly advertising, fashion and product imagery with which I find myself surrounded, and the images I have absorbed in the past - on the internet, in magazines and books, or in public space.
My work deals with the seductive aesthetics of this photography, in order to recreate and analyze commercials with a sense of (visual) humor. It can be regarded as a visual critique of, as well as an artistic homage to, our expansive consumption society.
Up to this day, I still organize my images in sections, which I give titles such as III. The Garden, IV. Ads, VI. The Breakfast, VII. Poster, XI. Illusion, and XII. Desserts. Reading those titles, a stock photography catalogue might come to mind. This growing archive of photographic series is a personal reflection on existing stereotypes.

Some of my photographs have been materialised into artist books and framed objects. In exhibitions, the intermediate zone of decoration and art installation is of interest to me, raising questions about the influence of commercialism and shop window design on the concept of 'Art' and the art installation (and vice versa). My images, presented in colourful or matching frames on stands, let the photographs become objects, they become products themselves. Both image and its placement together serve and re-examine the fine line between art and decoration.

In the past 15 years, I have worked both as an artist with the medium photography and as a commercial photographer mainly in the fashion and advertising industry, shooting product and fashion editorials for print magazines and online campaigns for Rimowa or Louis Vuitton. Because of my commercial photography work, it seems, I become even more aware of the stereotypes I am referring to in my personal series. To me, Art, as well as commercial photography change and influence each other.