Christoph Brech

PHOTOGRAPHIC DIARY ROM Christoph Brech By Arnold Nesselrath Eternal Moment Rome is probably the only modern dependent on descriptions of it. In painters, sculptors, architects, metropolis in the world where ruins traditions, however, this culture still photographers, filmmakers and now figure among the major attractions. lives on and provides us with an video artists as Rome has over the As early as 1100, Hildebert de opportunity to encounter it. centuries. Artists from Italy, as well Lavardin (1056 - 1133 or 1134), a Although towards the end of the as many foreign countries, often pilgrim to Rome and bishop of the eighteenth century the settled here and found patrons. With distant city of Le Mans in France, Enlightenment seems to have the photographic diary he produced began a poem about Rome with the conclusively dictated a re- during his year as an artist in emphatic verse "Rome, without orientation of Occidental culture, residence at the Villa Massimo, the compare, though all but shattered" the fathers of the European Union German artists’ academy in Rome, or in the original Latin version “Par chose precisely Rome as the place Christoph Brech stands, at least at tibi, Roma, nihil, cum sis prope tota to set down their ideas for a this moment, as the latest in a long ruina”. These are the ruins from peaceful continent after the series of artists from north of the which Christianity emerged. No gruesome catastrophe of the Second Alps for whom the city represented conqueror was ever able to reign World War. This is where they the destination of a pilgrim age for over Rome, regardless of how far it signed the underlying treaty for the two reasons: as the centre of contracted within its ancient walls, establishment of the European Christianity and as a Mecca of art. or how much the glorious Forum Union just over half a century ago. Christoph Brech characterised every Romanum degenerated to a campo Mass tourism to Rome in our day, day he spent in Rome through a vaccino. The conquerors were far which is currently on the rise, photograph taken on that particular more inclined to be influenced by provides a bizarre indication of day. There are only two gaps due to Rome. The tremendous achieve- Rome's undiminished attraction and, absences. Short excursions to ments of Bramante, Michelangelo, at the same time, a danger for Occi- Olevano, Ostia, Palestrina, Frascati and Raphael, of Borromini, Bernini, dental culture on the whole. or Tivoli belong to the classic and Pietro da Cortona during the The most recent, materialistic mani- programme of any visitor to Rome: Renaissance and Baroque periods festation of the conviction inherent “Rome and Environs” is a typical always stood in contrast to the in Hildebert's dictum and title for a tourist guidebook. These spectacular antique statuary and humanistic phrasing, in the version locations appear in Brech’s frescoes found by simple vineyard rendered by the art historian and photographs in haunting ex- owners, clever grave robbers, former mayor of Rome Giulio Carlo periments with colour, distorted curious clerics, and many other Argan (7909 - 7992), sounds, compositions, blurred effects or treasure seekers. despite his charming Italian diction, enamoured motifs similar to local While popes and municipal govern- like a metaphysical invocation: districts of Rome. ments wavered between competition “Roma è una città eterna, perché la The diary not only views and cooperation in their attempts to sua decadenza non finisce mai” – monuments from a highly individual change the face of the city, the an- “Rome is an eternal city, because its perspective, the author has also cient grottos and extensive network decadence will never end.” observed people who live in Rome, of underground passageways under How inspiring the eternal city was who change the city and therefore the Oppian, a spur of the Esquiline, and still can be, is best expressed by its monuments consciously or one of the Seven Hills of Rome, visual artists, few of whom ever unconsciously, noticeably or proved to be the remains of Nero's actually came from Rome. Most of unnoticeably, but in any case overwhelming Golden House. Little those whose achievements shaped inevitably. We encounter them all: has been preserved of the ephemeral our image of the city were born the greengrocer and the butcher, the creations of Roman festive culture, nearly anywhere else but in Rome. dedicated teacher and her class, and which was not only very elaborate No other centre of art, neither Paris, the lonely demonstrator, the during the Baroque period, but nor London, nor New York has ever policemen, the member of the throughout the ages. We are attracted as many draughtsmen, guardia, on foot and horseback, the restorer and the beggars and streets and piazzas beyond the Vatican Museums and which he homeless, the tourists and the historical centre in Rome at this sensed in the encounter between the newlyweds, the passers-by and all time of year. In doing so, he looks antique statues of the Laocoon ranks of clergy. Despite the many into the architecture of an urban Group and Okwui Enwezor, the spontaneously recorded moments, landscape from the first half of the Nigerian curator of the Documenta including the mood captured before last century which, despite the XI in Kassel, together with a friend, an impending thunder storm (21 anonymity of its hybrid stacking, is the Ethiopian video artist and film April) or under the oppressive still reminiscent of the sight-lines director Theo Eshetu (13 weight of the yellow Scirocco (18 drawn by Benozzo Gozzoli for Fra December). On this same occasion September), the laconic captions, Angelico in the private chapel of he came into close proximity with which reveal only the street or the Pope Nicholas V at the Vatican Pope Benedict XVI (16 December). place where the photograph was tak- around 1450. On six different days en - and of course the date - always of the year Christoph Brech takes us Christoph Brech’s photographic ensure that a certain distance is with him to Santa Maria Maggiore, diary was created out of a digital maintained to the subject depicted. where he has also come to feel at sketchbook. The first painter whom The observer is expected to puzzle home, even singing in the church we know by name and who over the individual pictures, to make choir on Sundays. He gives us a undertook a journey to Rome was discoveries in them, to read them, to personal tour, he needs no guide, no Master Bertram of Minden. We continue the stories they tell, to canon or monsignor to unlock know about his sojourn because he interact with the people, to perhaps anything for him. On the contrary, took the precaution of drafting a be reminded of a personal Brech demonstrates a familiarity by will before departing from Hamburg experience in Rome, to be inspired differentiating the views he pro- in 1390 in case anything happened or irritated, or to simply be affected vides: the pull of the seemingly end- to him during the long trip, as was by the light, colours and shapes. It is less abyss as seen from Bernini’s indeed the case a century and a half impossible to comprehend hidden spiral staircase, in which later, in 1537, when the young Hans everything, only those who have square bronze rods seem to bite Cranach, the son of Lucas Cranach carefully watched life and people in through marble (3 August), is con- the Elder, died in Bologna at the age everyday Rome will be able to trasted with the metaphysical light of 24. Most artists came to Rome at understand many of the allusions that flooded the decorated basilica an early age in order to gather (such as on 19 August). like an apparition on the day before impressions and to further their the celebration of the church’s con- training. For many the city was the Christoph Brech’s kaleidoscope of secration (4 August). Naturally, important final destination of their Rome follows his ramblings through Christoph Brech also quoted some years as an apprentice or the city. Conceived as a of the creative work from his journeyman. We encounter their en- photographic diary, the artist tells us Roman video installations within thusiasm in numerous sketchbooks about himself through his work. this year: on 31 March, his film in which they collected their visual Unlike the globalised tourist, or “Punto” which like the photographic impressions as fleeting notes, as those who travel for the education - diary deals with colours, shapes, precisely drawn vistas, or by if there still are such people - he sounds, and motion in the city, and capturing a statue accurately, some initially only risks a furtive glance on 4 April, 24 July and 16 detail of an architectural element, or at the Capitol: from the rear (14 November, his major portrait project whatever else roused their curiosity. March). His Rome, however, at the Campo Verano Cemetery While only a few of the sheets revolves around the Villa Massimo, “Ritratto Romano” the theme of produced in the wake of a visit to which is alone the subject of 19 which is the people who lived and Rome in 1508/1509 by the Dutch pages in his calendar, including a died in Rome 100 years ago. He was Painter Jan Gossaert, known as photograph of the participants of the particularly affected by the Mabuse, have been preserved (fig. sundrenched Palm Sunday children’s graves he found in the 1), a whole book and a number of Procession, staged annually on the expansive cemetery of the individual drawings still exist by grounds of the estate, in metropolis in nearby Prima Porta (5 one of his compatriots a generation complementary hues of light green June and 11 October).

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