Vanishing
Vanishing
Engraved in ghostly black and white, Anna Arendt’s debut monograph, Vanishing, conjures a world of dreamlike dread and beauty.
Arendt was born in the German Democratic Republic. She was 24 when The Wall fell, her daughter was 2. Her parents were born 1940 in Germany, children of war. Both of her grandfathers had been soldiers, who had been in Poland between 1940 and 1942. One came back 2 years after the war was over, the other one never returned.
Photographed between Germany and Poland over 15 years, the work slides back and forth through time like a blood memory. Walking naked through the dark forest, wolves circling, howling. A daughter becoming a mother becoming a grandmother becoming a child. Haunted villages, and souls in jeopardy. The harsh reality of the past merges seamlessly with moments of rapture that feel plucked from a Grimm fairy tale.
Vanishing is an unforgettable depiction of how beauty and brutality coexist in the hearts of men and beasts.
From the Artist:
My name is Anna Arendt.
But that isn't the name my parents gave me when I was born.
I was born and spent my life in the German Democratic Republic.
It was a dictatorship. Many of us lived in fear.
The Stasi was everywhere.
I was 24 when the Wall fell.
My daughter was 2.
The Stasi was dissolved.
But the fear remains.
Both my parents were born 1940 in Germany.
Both children of war.
My grandfathers had been soldiers.
Both had been in Poland between 1940 and 1941.
One came back 2 years after the war was over.
The other one never came back home.
I remember the faces of my grandmothers, my mother, my father when I asked questions about the war. I remember this first as a child, later as a young woman, then as a mother, and now as a grandmother myself. There were no answers. Only silence and tears.
As a child I found a way to open a secret shelf that contained photo albums of my family. This is where I discovered the power of a picture. A picture taken in summer 1940. A young family, my grandmother, her baby and my grandfather in a German uniform. A picture full of contradictions, carrying ambivalent feelings even until today.
For 15 years my photographs led me in circles.
Circles around strangers and family. From my home to places far away. Through cities and villages, forests and concentration camps. To my friend Antje giving birth to a beautiful girl, and and then alongside her during her last days on this earth. From tender moments with my husband, Adam, to his mother as she passed away. From watching my daughter becoming a young woman, to her giving birth to my grandson.
Circles, always circles.
When the world seems broken, I go to the forest.
I like wolves, ravens, crows and deer.
Looking into the eyes of a wild animal reminds me about reality.
About beauty and brutality.
Making pictures is my way to move on.
Details:
Hardcover, Linen with Faux Leather
Tipped-in image
144 Pages
7 x 9.5 inches
Printed China
ISBN: 978-1-7362345-5-9
Release: May 2025
*Preorder - Shipping in May