DISCO KEBAB is Bastian Hertel's colorful, good-humored invitation to a change of perspective after about eight years of black-and-white photography. Or in other words: A photographic escapism due to the zeitgeist with a desire for color, content contrasts and sun.

Bastian flew to Mallorca for 4 days at the end of January 2022 for this project and visited Calla Millor, Magaluf and S'Arenal - three cities that stand for unrestrained mass tourism and debauched party life. DISCO KEBAB deals in extracts with the contrasts of these places that "nobody" visits, but which nevertheless have something beautiful to offer. The series aesthetically exposes the unkept promises written on the colorful billboards in the bright blue midday sky.

Bastian subjectivizes the motifs; partly through a slightly tilted perspective upwards, which thereby formally imposes the photographer's personal view on the locations, or in which the chosen cropping, leaves out everything that should not be seen.

This subjectification is also continued in the presentation of the exhibition. The colorful plate material quotes in its structure the materials used on the objects, to be seen in the example of the many closed shutters.

The series contains street photographic, as well as strongly compositional elements. A learned set of rules from Bastian's earlier works. All in all, however, it also represents a certain paradigm shift in his photographic work, since in this case he dispenses with people as subjects and focuses on a concept.

 


 

BTW