"Behind the Frames"

For the last couple of years Anna Heinrihsone has used photographs from the family archive (from 1930s till 1950s) as a motif for her paintings. Focusing on the moments where the protagonists are liberated and emotionally close to one another – first bike ride as a couple, skier who isn’t confident about her skills, mother kicking a soccer ball – within the paintings it all is turned into a long, visual line. What happens behind the scenes  of the photograph is the continuation in the painting. The black-and-white picture of the past turns into an imaginary act. In miniature painting format, the motif of a photo comes to life from black and white to colour, expanding and showing what is not seen in the small, antique-framed, old-fashioned photograph.
The inspiration for the latest exhibition came to Anna Heinrihsone after her encounter with the German photography collector Jochen Raiß’s book ‘Frauen auf Bäumen’ (Women in the Trees). Within it, as the title implies, Jochen Raiß has compiled black and white photographs, acquired over a long period of time, of women climbing branches of a wide variety of trees.