Work group IV · 9 works
A day at the sea
Pure photography between crossing, beach and horizon
“A day at the sea” is Olli Boehm’s photo series about the sea as a place of calm. It begins on a ferry deck, follows the beach, the promenade and the pier, and ends in the dunes. People appear small within it, as silhouettes or figures seen from behind; at the center are light, expanse and the quiet things by the water.
Unlike in Boehm’s overpainted works, the photography here remains unaltered. Reduction, fine tonal values and a clear composition carry the effect. Black and white dominates, and color appears only as an accent: orange in the lifebuoy, a cool blue above the beach.
Crossing
Beach
Promenade and Dunes
Curatorial Perspective
I
Description
Nine photographs from the ferry deck to the dunes: empty benches, a lifebuoy, beach chairs, a lantern, people on a pier, a man with a dog and a lighthouse. The series works with expanse, backlight and fine grain.
II
Idea
The series tells a day by the sea as a movement from arrival to expanse. People remain small, the light large. Each picture holds a moment of calm in which nothing has to happen.
III
Context
The pictures stand between street photography and minimalist landscape photography, in dialogue with Hiroshi Sugimoto’s Seascapes, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Michael Kenna. Against Martin Parr’s ironic view of the beach, Boehm sets stillness.
IV
What sets it apart
“Ferry, Open Deck” and “Ferry, Lifebuoy” open the series as a pair, while “Basket Chair” and “Two Basket Chairs” form a pair with different tonality. With “Lantern,” a vertical work in a soft tone is part of the series.
V
For collectors & spaces
The series offers calm photographs that combine easily, for practices, hotels, law firms, lounges and living spaces. Individual works stand on their own; together they form a sequence that can be told across a wall.