Dark Valleys
Study VII | ongoing
In the black of dawn, a whisper leads the way,
The same breath rules limbs in another world.
A border of mist divides them, only shattered by the drums.
Mountains are their cathedrals, and woods are their homes.
The sacrifice of mortality revealed on their skin.
Otherworld - will bring future past,
the dark valleys never die.
You will.
ABOUT
Georg Katstaller explores his DarkValleys as photographic studies that operate according to philosophical propositions about humans and other entities of essence and existence, of being and becoming. Katstaller merges the observable material reality of the Austrian Alps with surreal and immaterial activity. The concept of intermediacy frames the primary theme of The Dark Valleys. This body of work is the artist's attempt to capture the connection between physical and spiritual worlds and the theological implications therein. Katstaller examines the relationships constructed between natural mythology, spiritual transcendence,and the inevitability of human mortality. Being confronted with Environments that indicate both absence and presence, the scenes Georg Katstaller creates are neverequal to their original meaning. His works move away from the simplicity of good and evil binaries and suggest an 'Other' or a third-place where neither identity is clear, and both are inextricably intertwined. His visual minimalism allows for a rare mode of representation, metaphoric of the schism between life and death.
Polina Shubkina