to my dearest father consists of a foldable sculpture that carries a series of C-prints. Both the sculpture and the prints function as an edition of 3. Here, Hurth focuses on the figure of Anna Atkins, a British amateur photographer, who produced the first book photographically illustrated in the mid 19th century. After several months spent in the archives of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Institute Archives, the International Center of Photography and the private collection of Hans Kraus Jr. (NYC), Hurth developed a series of material investigations, drawings, arrangements of objects and words that take their origin from the research and the encounters in the archives. The first synthetic color (Prussian blue) and its use in painting, photography and chemistry (eventually leading to suicidal acts in History), together with instruments that measure the hues of the sky, and the development of photography and its technology became the center for Hurth poetic research.The sculpture, vaguely replicates a printing establishment from Atkins’ time, and carries photographic captures of her research. The accumulation of material is translated in those prints balancing on each other: creating a monumental archive, at once both delicate and visually arresting.

to my dearest father
2014
flat iron and C-Prints (each A1) 190 x 160cm (folded), edition of 3

Installation views:
Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2015)
ISCP, New York (2014)