Leipzig photographer Frank Berger brings together two projects, Traffic Assistants
(Shanghai 2008) and Theseus and Kentaur (Vienna 2007) in this handsome
slipcased two-volume set accompanying a museum exhibition. Comprised of
extensive series of photographic images taken in a single setting, both projects
depict variations of mundane dramas in identical frames. Shot in high-resolution
on reversal color slide film and exhibited as projections, the pictures do not
capture a unique moment, but (in exhibition) are presented in an endless loop
of similar but layered images, a method that perhaps can be described as a
gesture of insistence. Human figures become heroic subjects of contemplation
in Theseus and Kentaur, or Chaplin-esque figures in Traffic Assistants, in which
police in Shanghai try to control local traffic. Whatever the subject, the insistent
look of the photographer transforms each setting into a visual stage, in which
the static scenery outlasts the cast of characters.