Above Körperfotogramm. (©Floris Neusüss/Courtesy of the Atlas Gallery).

‘For me making a photogram is almost the opposite of making photographs,’ says Floris Neusüss, a German born artist and teacher, who has devoted his entire career to exploring  the potential of camera-less photography through the photogram, a term first used by Lazlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946), and replacing the earlier description of ‘light compositions.’

Working within the principles set down by Man Ray (1890-1976), Neusüss has ‘developed the spectrum of the aesthetic possibilities of the photogram,’ writes Klaus Honnef, and whilst artists such as Man Ray, Moholy-Nagy, and Christian Schad (1894-1982), preceded Neusüss, they regarded the photogram as a ‘desideratum for their own artistic work.’

‘In the photogram the viewer distinguishes the fragmentarily fixed object as a quotation of reality,’ says Neusüss, ‘But this perception is kept from sticking to the portrayal, because the picture includes as a decisive message a certain action, a dealing with reality, not letting it appear as given, but as potentially variable,’ and encouraging the viewer to contemplate the very essence of form.

Floris Neusüss is at the Atlas Gallery, London until 27 November 2010. Neusüss’ work, along with Pierre Cordier, Susan Derges, Garry Fabian Miller and Adam Fuss form the exhibition Shadow Catchers: Camera-less Photography, at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London until 20 February 2011.

Recommended reading Floris Neusüss: Nachtstüke Fotogramme 1957 bis 1997, Rheinland Verlag, 1997.