“Polis – Bilder von Städten / Cities in Images” is the result of a long-term photographic study: From 2007 to 2011, Christa Ziegler travelled to numerous mega cities, primarily in Africa, Asia and South America. This publication brings together hundreds of photographs taken from the perspective of the artist’s walking.
The motif is urban space with its visible interlocking of the economic, social and spatial living conditions of its population. Christa Ziegler directs the interest to the view of the city as an autonomous body: its built organization, its surfaces, its architectural monotony, its zones of inclusion and exclusion. In doing so, the artist follows a decidedly reserved observation that unconditionally acknowledges the boundaries between public and private. As a phenomenological basis, “Polis – Bilder von Städten / Cities in Images” would like to contribute to a reflection on the relationship between architecture and living spaces, between economic and demographic development, between global speculation and urban development that gives preference to socially acceptable, culturally adequate, qualitative living spaces.
The comprehensive publication is presented as a pure illustrated book with a consistent layout grid and in black and white. A separate text edition will be published, which is intended as a continued series and this time contains contributions by Khaled Al-Khamissi, Hilan Bensusan, Kaiwan Metha, Peter Suter, Monica Udler Cromberg, Isabel Zürcher and a conversation between Al Imfeld and Mandu dos Santos Pinto. The authors expand the reading of the pictures from literary, essayistic, urban planning and cultural-historical perspectives.