Helmut Hirler
ABOUT HELMUT HIRLER
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Helmut Hirler is an incredible fine art photographer hailing originally from Germany, who has lived for many years with his artist wife Sally Maguire on their property in Waipawa. We met them for coffee and were treated to a tour of their gallery and to view their wonderful art.
Helmut has photographed his way around the world, developing his art and his incredible portfolio of work that has shown in a vast amount of global exhibitions and publications in addition to winning an extraordinary number of awards. His style of photography is quite unlike anything we have seen before - a technique he has labelled 'The Magic of the Invisible'. He explains: "For many years I have been practising the imaging of our environment with the help of invisible light known as infrared. An infrared film is like an ordinary black and white film, however with an extended spectral sensitivity reaching into the infrared range. To be able to work with the infrared spectrum exclusively, I have to use a filter - the so-called 'black filter' - to block out the visible light spectrum. Consequently, when I take a photo I see nothing at all, and it is always fascinating to discover the results when developing the film. That's only the first step of the fascination when one works with infrared light. My main incentive is to capture living plants in much brighter shades of colour, even in tones of white." It is so evident in Helmut's images how very much he loves photography, the environment, the landscape - and now, lucky for us - this country we call home. In his own words: "A landscape lives in the eyes of the beholder. It is out there and in him as well. It becomes his point of view, reflecting his human personality. It will deeply impress itself upon him so as to become HIS picture." We are very fortunate to present two of Helmut's key pieces. Images from his 'Forgotten Kiwis' series - these photographs set vertically on aluminium are wonderful pieces with high appeal. |
