Andrea Geyer (b. 1971, Freiburg, Germany) studied photography and film design at the Fachhochschule Bielefeld and fine art at the Braunschweig University of Art, both in Germany. She is a 2000 graduate of the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program. Geyer lives and works in New York.
Geyer’s work ranges across multiple media, incorporating text, photography, painting, sculpture, video and performance. It explores the complex politics of time, in the context of specific social and political situations, cultural institutions and historical events. From her early investigations into urban environments, cultural landscapes and notions of citizenship to more recent research into women’s contributions to modernism, Geyer’s work continuously seeks to create spaces of critical, collective reflection on the construction of histories and ideas that are otherwise marginalised or obscured.
This series of photographic collages titled Constellations (2018) form Geyer’s most recent contribution to her continuously relevant project. Here, reimagined portraits depict some of the influential women who held salons – informal social gatherings that brought individuals of diverse social classes together to exchange ideas, strategies and resources – in the US, Europe and beyond, significantly impacting the culture and politics of their time. To reflect on the refraction of their stories, actions, and significance away from mainstream historic accounts and collective memories, the inspiration for these drawings came from a study of Joseph Albers' “Structural Constellations”, executed in the 1950s and embodying his experiments with visual ambiguity: Geyer’s Constellations series map the recognizable pattern of presence and absence of these women, reintroducing ways of looking that allow their recognition today.
Click here to visit the preview.
