As a budding photographer, Sandra Mann found it difficult to see herself as an artist. This changed in 2001 when Mann, still a student at the HfG Offenbach, exhibited at the Frankfurt Museum of Modern Art (MMK). In a collection exhibition, she presented the installation Expedit, a wall-mounted Ikea shelf, filled with vinyl records from different times, genres and countries, all of which contain the word »love« in the title. The installation forms part of the MMK collection. Sandra Mann is also represented in the Art Collection Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation. Today she defines herself as an artist with a focus on photography.

Currently, Sandra Mann is working on a series of partly staged portraits of people in nature. »The forest becomes the stage,« she explains. It is the relationships and fluid transitions of people with their surroundings, nature and animal world, which he wants to explore. But it is also about misleading the viewers' expectations, »in relation to photography, as a medium closest to reality.« Not everything is always as it seems in the photographs.

Some works from this series were on view in the spring of 2016, in the exhibition Doppelgänger in the Californian Torrance Art Museum. Sandra Mann conceived and curated the show, in which contemporary artistic positions from Germany were presented along with work by American colleagues. She showed her photographs in the form of a modular, sculptural staging, instead of only hanging them on the walls. »I don’t only work two-dimensionally, but also in relation to space,« she emphasises. A book is now being created from the Wald series. Sandra Mann had already published books for previous projects. From her HfG Diplom in 2003, a compilation of photographs from nightlife and music scenes titled NIGHT LIFE came about. The book DAYLIFE was published in 2008 at a solo exhibition in Istanbul.

Before her graduation, Sandra Mann was playing with the idea of going into advertising. She came to the HfG Offenbach because one could study both fine arts and applied graphics. From painting she developed towards photography after completing her pre-Diplom. She realised her Diplom project finally in the subject area of Experimental Spatial Concepts. The open structure of the university suited Mann: »I am very curious and inquisitive, which is probably why there are so many pillars.« She advises students today and in the future to make many contacts during their studies and to exhibit as much as possible.

Works

231100-0002 Sandra mit Bart

Photography, 2002
Art Collection Deutsche Börse
Expedit II

Exhibition view of the installation Exhibition »Morir de Amor« in the MUCA
(Museo Universitario de Ciencias y Arte)
Mexiko Stadt, 2005

Kuratiert von Pamela Echeverria
Nahaufnahme / Detail (090302-0015 Love Records)

Installation »Expedit«
Exhibition Szenenwechsel XX
Museum für Moderne Kunst Frankfurt, 2001

Kuratiert von Prof. Dr. Jean-Christophe Ammann
Strapinskis Schicksal

Exhibition view of the photo installation
»No Fashion, Please!«
Kunsthalle Wien, 2011

Kuratiert von Prof. Peter Weiermair
Marie Therese

room installation
Exhibition view in a youth hostel
Photofestival Mailand
Galeria San Carlo New Contemporary
2007

Kuratiert von Benedetta de Magistris & Marta Casati
150909-2789 Schafe & Autos (Offenbach)

Photography
2009
110515-9893 Written on Bourgeois Body

Jos Diegel & Shirin
(Offenbach-Bürgel, Germany)
Photography
2015
»Innige Verbindung«, 2016 (050915-9413 & 050915-9466 Erin Kirk) & Serie »Holla die Waldfee«, 2012-2016

Exhibition view Kunsthalle Darmstadt Photoinstallation
10 gerahmte Fotografien
Zeitenwende / Saluting the End

Exhibition view
JAUS Los Angeles, USA, 2011
Ausstellung mit Lewis Baltz, Thomas Draschan, Bea Emsbach, Christine de la Garenne, Nathalie Grenzhaeuser, Florian Heinke, Anny & Sibel Öztürk, Manfred Peckl, Marcus Sendlinger, Johannes Spehr, Karsten Thormaehlen, Eva Weingärtner und Michael Wutz

Kuratiert von Sandra Mann
Doppelgänger

Exhibition view
Torrance Art Museum, USA, 2016
Transfer-Ausstellung mit Kio Griffith, Ichiro Irie, John Knuth, Eric Yahnker, Roland Reiss, Britton Tolliver, Lena Wolek, (USA), Christiane Feser, Christine de la Garenne, Sandra Kranich, Anny & Sibel Öztürk, Manfred Peckl, Ekrem Yalcindag und Tobias Rehberger (GER)

Kuratiert von Dr. phil. Julia-Constance Dissel & Sandra Mann / Ichiro Irie & Max Presneil
Doppelgänger

Exhibition view
Torrance Art Museum, USA, 2016
Transfer-Ausstellung mit Kio Griffith, Ichiro Irie, John Knuth, Eric Yahnker, Roland Reiss, Britton Tolliver, Lena Wolek, (USA), Christiane Feser, Christine de la Garenne, Sandra Kranich, Anny & Sibel Öztürk, Manfred Peckl, Ekrem Yalcindag und Tobias Rehberger (GER)

Kuratiert von Dr. phil. Julia-Constance Dissel & Sandra Mann / Ichiro Irie & Max Presneil
NIKE Deutschand GmbH

commission photography
Stille Wasser sind tief

Catalog of singel exhibitions »Stille Wasser sind tief«
Regierungspräsidium Darmstadt
Fotografie & Bildsprache

Presentation of Fototage at Fürsteneck Castle, 2016

Foto: Karsten Thormaehlen
BRITA Kunstpreis 2015

Preface as a jury member detailed view
CRITICA

Internet view CRITICA
Journal of Philosophy and Art Theory editorial member
XL PHOTOGRAPHY 5

catalog view
Art Collection Deutsche Börse AG, 2015
Artists:
Aymeric Fouquez, Bruce Davidson, Deutschlandreise, Diane Arbus, Ernst Haas, Evelyn Hofer, Gerd Danigel, Gunnar Smoliansky, Ivo Kuhn, John Stezaker, Karl Hugo Schmölz, Lucas Foglia, Mike Brodie, Mirko Krizanovic, Paul Fusco, Pentti Sammallahti, Peter Bialobrzeski, Regine Petersen, Richard Mosse, Sandra Mann, Vivian Maier