“The Line // What Remained of the Water” shows flood lines and traces on interior walls of residential buildings that the flood of the century in 2021 made visible on the Ahr River after the water levels had passed. After furniture, memories and pictures had been removed and the silt had been shoveled away, traces of water testify to the catastrophe in the living rooms and bedrooms. Scratches on shifted furniture, edges of pictures that recently hung on the walls. And again and again, imprints of hands. Helpers’ hands, residents’ hands. As if calling for help or as a testimony of having been here. In the midst of a great, barely describable catastrophe.

David Klammer photographed the series in various villages and towns on the Ahr: in Dernau, Rech and Mayschoß. The water had run off, the homes deserted. Everything personal that makes a home had disappeared, the mud dried. In its black and white two-dimensionality, the series shows traces and inklings of personal fates. A non-space that will be filled again with life and new memories. “It seemed to me like Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. I could only see shadows, but not their source,” says the photographer.

David Klammer. Born in Berlin in 1961. Studied communication design with Prof. Angela Neuke and Prof. Klaus Armbruster. After graduating in 1996, he worked as a photographer for Stern, Geo, Die Zeit or Time Magazine. Since 2006, David Klammer has increasingly worked on freelance projects, which he finances himself or through grants. Klammer has been a member of the photo agency laif since 2007.

davidklammer.com
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