Manuel Schroeder

My artistic practice operates at the intersection of photography, painting, sound, and installation. At its core lies an exploration of the human condition within the urban environment and the ways in which social, economic, and cultural processes become inscribed into the fabric of the city.
I am particularly interested in traces of transformation and decay in public space: vacant urban sites, industrial remnants, and the dissolving visual and linguistic landscapes of commercial advertising. I regard these places and fragments as visual and acoustic archives in which memory and the present converge.
Through digital photography and sound recording, I document these ephemeral phenomena before they disappear. The resulting image and sound archives form the foundation of my artistic work in painting, décollage, video, and light and sound installations.
Vacant urban spaces simultaneously serve as sites for artistic intervention, exhibition, and performance. Former industrial areas become stages for light and sound works, while photographic, painterly, and décollage-based pieces transform the material and social contexts of these places into new aesthetic constellations.
The works that emerge from this process approach the city as a liv...

1962
born in Herford/Germany
living in Berlin/Germany
working in Germany, (East) Europe, USA

1983-85
study of drums at “L‘Ecole Dante Agostini”, Duesseldorf/Germany

1983-2007
musician (drummer, composer, leader in jazz and electronic music projects)

1986-93
apprenticeship as typesetter, repro-photographer and graphic designer, Krefeld & Essen/Germany

since 1987
working in photography, fine art, video art

1999-2001
study of drawing & painting at SGD Academy, Darmstadt/Germany

since 1994
solo and group exhibitions, publications, artworks in private and public art collections, founderships & leaderships of regional and international art and culture projects, video- & sound installations in public urban spaces, crossmedial projects with performing artists, art communication at universities, colleges and schools