Status

Niedling does not take on a journey by representing past lifeworlds, but by depicting an ephemeral state, a situation in transition in which pasts shimmer through, and at the same time questions are raised about the future. How much will be visible of the historically developed state of affairs after the museum’s renovation, what role will this play for the later viewing of the museum’s holdings? (…) Niedling is not interested in art that accommodates the beholder. He creates photographic works that are thoroughly conceptualized, that can also be read as commentaries on the found situations. His aesthetics results from an intention of depiction, that free of pathos, but not without feeling sketches the site of art and also allows us to see the coincidental, the provisional with other eyes. Not just the square mentioned at the outset, but also the fluorescent lighting in the attic is given an installative character, and is reminiscent of a work by Dan Flavin. Here, the slightly diagonal direction of the gaze gives the space a sense of dynamism. The broad spectrum of the images is not denunciatory, but allows for discoveries of their ambivalence. If there is a message, then it is that photography is freed from its role as a subservient medium and that space and time can be suspended in it. (Excerpt from  Status, Text by Kerstin Stremmel, EIKON Sonderdruck #11, ÖIP – Österreichisches Institut für Photographie & Medienkunst, Vienna, 2007)