Annette Kelm Erich Maria Remarque, Im Westen nichts Neues, 1929 Propyläen Verlag, Berlin, Einbandgestaltung Werner Beucke, 2019
Archival pigment print
70 x 52,5 cm (unframed)
71,4 x 53,9 x 4 cm (framed)
71,4 x 53,9 x 4 cm (framed)
Edition of 6
The Burnt Books series depicts copies of publications that were condemned as "un-German" and publicly burned by the National Socialists in 1933. Set against a bright and evenly light white surface and placed in the center of the composition, Annette Kelm’s photographs of books can appear like portraits. In a matter-of-fact style, the photographs from the series appear to imbue these books with a dignity of historical witnesses. The images honor the historical significance of these objects as "survivors", drawing attention to the special role of objects in the formation of a society’s collective memory, after the disappearance of contemporaneous witnesses. In addition to authors such as Else Lasker Schüler, Erich Kästner, and Stefan Zweig, Kelm's 24 photographs also make lesser-known authors visible and show that even children's books were subject to censorship.