Work Description

In their project "Shops with History – Sundry Goods in Vienna", Martin Frey and Philipp Graf have been photographing old business portals in Vienna since 2009. Each page of their online gallery www.geschaeftemitgeschichte.at contains 32 photographs; 24 of these will then be selected for printing in each volume of the photobook, which will be released in a small numbered and signed edition. A photograph commemorating a shop that no longer exists will be attached to the front cover of the book. The book block will be produced using four-colour offset printing, while the protective cover and text pages will be printed digitally. Each copy will feature hand-sewn binding and be wrapped in cellophane. Volume 4 contains an unusually large proportion of businesses whose roller shutters have been lowered forever. Almost all of them have since vanished from the cityscape. Nevertheless, at the time of this volume’s publication, more than half of the depicted businesses still exist. Collectively, the photographed shopfronts once again represent a very vibrant mix of extremely diverse fields and occupations: children’s clothing, hardware, home and kitchen appliances, confectionery, jewellery, jewellers’ supplies and goldsmith equipment, retail clothing store, costume hire, electrician, grocer, horse butcher, dairy shop, stationery, flower shop, leather goods, perfume shop and chemist’s shop, lottery ticket seller and book exchange for novels, optician, a cinema, manufacturer of and a bar.