Jan Paul Evers
Jan Paul Evers
In Jan Paul Evers’ oeuvre, photography as “impression of reality” is subversively dissolved. His pictures neither document nor stage a “reality” that unfolds before the camera’s lens. The starting point is his digital image archive of found motifs and motifs of his own, which are first processed with Photoshop, printed out and then photographed analogously. The decisive moment in Jan Paul Evers’ work process takes place in the darkroom, where the final motif is “worked out” during the factual image formation with templates using analog processing methods such as dodging, masking, post-exposure, or gradation splitting. This “sculptural handling” of photography produces a unique copy instead of a “reproduction” of reality. In this sense, Jan Paul Evers’ works show an “image genesis” in which documentation and abstraction, visible surface and hidden code, past and present collaps into each other. The art historian Florian Ebner aptly writes: “The pleasure taken in the photographic material, a bit of punk and a very precise creative gaze come together in Jan Paul Evers’ work and start dancing.”
Jan Paul Evers (born 1982, DE) lives and works in Cologne. He was awarded the Große Hans-Purrmann-Preis der Stadt Speyer. His works are included in institutional collections such as Museum Folkwang, Essen; Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf; Fotomuseum Winterthur; and the Art Collection of the Federal Republic of Germany. His work has been presented in solo exhibitions at institutions including Villa Stuck, Munich, and Kunsthalle Lingen. Group exhibitions include Photography to the Test of Abstraction at FRAC Normandie Rouen (FR); Nullpunkt der Orientierung. Fotografie als Verortung im Raum at Art Foyer DZ Bank, Frankfurt am Main (DE); Germany Is No Island. Art Collection of the Federal Republic of Germany at Bundeskunsthalle Bonn (DE); Black & White. From Dürer to Eliasson at Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf (DE); and so wie wir sind at Weserburg Museum für moderne Kunst, Bremen (DE). Recent group exhibitions include It’s the 21st Century That Expects Everything from You at Haunt, Berlin (DE), and Kybernetik. Vernetzte Systeme at DZ Bank Art Foundation, Frankfurt am Main (DE). From 25 February 2026, his work will be shown in the group exhibition n+1. Mehr als ein Bild at Kunststiftung DZ Bank, Frankfurt am Main (DE).
