Werner Nekes: Reframing landscapes

Werner Nekes (1944 – 2017) is one of the key figures of German avant-garde cinema. In the mid-1960s, he traded the visual arts for a 16mm camera and began experimenting with both the filming and editing process. 

Landscapes – from Hamburg to Sweden – are a recurring motif in his work. Using single-frame shots and multiple exposures, he dissects and reconstructs these landscapes in a way that touches on the original magic and wonder of the medium. Nekes referred to his films as ​“light theater,” a play with optical illusions.

In Photophthalmia, this dialogue with pre-cinema emerges most explicitly. The film pays tribute to Ghent professor Joseph Plateau, the founding father of the cinematographic principle. According to legend, Plateau stared at the sun for so long during his research into afterimages that it left him blind.

• Filmprints: DFF – Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum
• Introduction by Larissa Krampert and Björn Schmitt (exf f. – tage des experimentellen films frankfurt)