TONI SCHNEIDERS & PETER KEETMAN

Brothers in spirit

Municipal Gallery in the Bathhouse
July 8 to September 18, 2022

In September 1949, six like-minded German photographers founded the legendary avant-garde group "fotoform." Among them were Peter Keetman (1916-2005) and Toni Schneiders (1920-2006), who invented a new language of photography at Lake Chiemsee and Lake Constance. Both boldly employed stylistic devices such as light and perspective, and their landscapes and nature studies, in particular, bear a striking resemblance to one another. The tenor of postwar German modernism was to restore the courage to create in photography, to break with conservatism, and to offer something convincingly new. Many of their images have become photographic icons and are etched into the collective visual memory under the term "subjective photography."

Toni Schneiders and Peter Keetman – two pioneers of post-war modern photography in Germany. Both shared a modern desire for design and abstraction on the one hand, and a humanistic worldview on the other. They shared the subject matter of their immediate surroundings in the Alpine foothills and an interest in the simple and the familiar.

Toni Schneiders also traveled the world, and his portraits and travelogues are characterized by humor and empathy for human nature. Despite his love of travel, he remained down-to-earth: "I have traveled to many countries – but I am equally happy to return to my family and Lake Constance – which I always try to depict in my paintings as a way of thanking myself for being able to live here." (Toni Schneiders)

Friend and colleague Peter Keetman dedicated himself to photographic experimentation and abstraction, for example in his masterful light pendulum oscillations. "What photography reveals to me are laws and beauties. The deeper I delve into matter through photography, the greater the worlds that open up." (Peter Keetman)

The friendship between these two pioneers lasted a lifetime, even as their personal projects and commissioned photography increasingly intertwined. Numerous letters between Lindau and Chiemsee, as well as mutual portraits, bear witness to this. Constantly exchanging ideas about photographic topics, they remained ever curious about new subjects – from the vast Alpine landscape to the reflection of light in a tiny droplet of water on a leaf.

Toni Schneiders (1920-2006) completed a photography apprenticeship in Koblenz in 1939, immediately after which he was drafted as a war correspondent. In 1948, Schneiders opened a photography studio in Lindau. In 1949, he became a founding member of the "fotoform" group and exhibited extensively both in Germany and abroad in connection with this group and in exhibitions on "subjective photography." He published his first travel photographs in Merian magazine and, from 1952 onward, undertook extended journeys to destinations including Ethiopia, Scandinavia, the Mediterranean region, and Southeast Asia. His photographs have appeared in nearly 200 illustrated books.

Peter Keetman (1916-2005) studied at the Bavarian State Institute for Photography in Munich from 1935 to 1937. In 1940, he was drafted into military service and returned disabled. He attended a master class at the Bavarian State Institute for Photography in Munich in 1948 and assisted Adolf Lazi in Stuttgart. Also in 1949, Keetman was a founding member of the "fotoform" group and the "subjective photography" movement, publishing and exhibiting his work within this context. He worked in many areas of photography – documenting the reconstruction of Munich, revealing hidden structures in landscapes and natural phenomena, and translating the dynamism of the economic miracle era into abstract images. In 1953, he created the series "A Week at the Volkswagen Plant."

The exhibition is being held in cooperation with the F.C. Gundlach Foundation.

Municipal Gallery In the Bathhouse
Lange Gasse 9
88239 Wangen im Allgäu
07522740
info@wangen.de

Opening hours
Tuesday to Friday 2 pm - 5 pm
Saturday 11am - 5pm
Sundays and public holidays 2 pm - 5 pm