Fotofinish – Siegeszug der Fotografie als künstlerische Gattung

The early 1990s, photography tentatively began to establish itself as a material in art as well as on the art market, but it was still a long way from achieving the status of an independent artistic genre. Today it is among the most diverse original forms that exist in current artistic discourse. Now at the zenith of its ascent, the question ­arises as to how long photog­raphy will continue to be used as an (independent) process in art. Digitisation has almost completely re­placed analogue techniques. These fundamental technical changes also change how we approach photography as such. In addition to a text by Christina Leber about the history of the DZ BANK art collection on the occasion of its 25th anniversary, this richly illustrated volume illuminates and reassesses the relationship between pho­tography and the other artistic genres in five essays: namely in relation to painting, drawing and sculpture, to the moving image and to conceptual art. It is about time to push open the window and look beyond the purely documentary function of photography as art that persisted in recent years, to refocus on the possibilities of this medium as art.