Hannah Schemel, born in Bühl, studied communication design with a focus on photography at the University of Mannheim. Since 2016, she has been working as an independent artist and exhibits her works nationwide in galleries and museums.

Schemels works show respect and humbleness for the individual subject. The sea, the sky and the forest do not impose themselves as central motives, but deepen in their elementary size to a moment between rest and strength. The black and white contrasts make the fog or the vastness of the sea tangible and impalpable at once. Light and shadow conjoin to a sensual, beautiful but also gloomy magic.

In her long-term projects, Schemel traces the origin of places, whether through her provenance (“kigen”) in the Black Forest or the mythical promise of the sea (“umi”) of Quiberon. With high precision which partly requires hour-long observation in the open air, her selection of subjects strives for a synesthetic perception. The pictures invite you to rediscover the beauty of the unimposing.

Influences from the Japanese culture become apparent particularly through the lightness and intentional asymmetry in the paintings of Hasegawa Tohakus from the 16th century and the essays on aesthetics by Tanizaki Jun’ichirō.

The recordings, almost detached from the passing of time, are symbiotically complemented by the masterful craftsmanship and the exquisite quality of material. Schemel captures earlier knowledge and turns every picture into a unique one.  Her photography is created with an analogue large format camera in nature. A hand-made paper especially developed for her, into which she lets her motives sink using a platinum-palladium mixture technique with a delicate Japanese paint brush made of goat hair, characterizes her work.