Floris Michael Neusüss: A connection

Floris Michael Neusüss is a German photographer who was known for his work in photograms. Neusüss expanded on the legacy of the earlier photogram artists such as Man Ray, and László Moholy-Nagy. Neusüss might have started later than some of the greats, but he could take photograms to a different larger level. This larger level was his whole-body photograms. These whole-body photograms appear to me as ghostly impressions.

These photograms are more than just interesting visual compositions. For me these photograms instead carry an immense emotional weight. When I look at these photograms I feel a sense of emptiness and absence. The sense that something was there once but is now long gone. The reason I feel this when looking at his whole-body photograms I am reminded of the shadows left behind in Nagasaki, and Hiroshima. This is where, after the atomic bombs detonated, the shadows were etched into the ground where the last victims were.

While I don’t know what Neusüss reason for this photogram is or what it might mean. One of the great things about art is the ability to interpret differently.  So, I see these photograms as something more than just lights and shadows. For me, it becomes a statement on the fragility of human existence.