Hidden Publics - publication

"Jens Besser is known for his extensive work as a graffiti artist. Many of his works can be seen while walking around Dresden, but he has left traces of his passage throughout the world. His photographic work is not as well known and is also based on graffiti. Some of his murals were created intentionally to be photographed, especially on sites to which spectators would not usually come,like abandoned houses. Photography allows the oft-transient graffiti to be preserved and documented. Many of his photographs are artworks in their own right. He integrates his interventions in buildings, on burned walls or train cars as compositional elements in them. Jens Besser also uses the special properties of the photographic medium: for example´, dark areas form a counterpoint to his colorful painting and so contribute to the meaning of the photo. Besser's wonderful graffiti works outdoors, the animal and human figures that Jens Besser evokes on the wall, in dialogue with the immediate environment and his own consciousness could be understood literally as "hidden publics". The areas of light and dark in his photographs can also elicit secret feelings, even fantasies." Text by Andrea Domesle. Published in Hidden Publics - exhibition catalogue. Publisher: Andrea Domesle & Walter Seidl , ISBN 978-3-9807388-4-2 , efau Verlag, Dresden The catalogue is available e.g. at riesa-efau Dresden .