The Palm Tree Workshops

Jessica Backhaus

25 - 29 November 2024

About the workshop

Daring Abstraction

Jessica Backhaus, who has been described as “one of the most distinguished voices in contemporary photography,” returns to Palm Tree Workshops this November to launch our new Athens-based workshop program.

A distinctive feature of her work is a fascinating interplay between the depiction of reality and enigmatic abstraction, with an emphasis on form, light, color, and other elements. Her workshop, “Daring Abstraction,” is designed to establish a playground for experimentation and inspire participants to work outside of their creative comfort zone. What happens when one approaches a new body of work with the power of their own intuition?

The workshop will be a journey into the unknown and a space for creative exchange. Participants will be supported and encouraged to find and develop their very own visual language. At the end of the workshop, there will be a small presentation featuring the resulting works.

About the artist

Jessica Backhaus is a German-American visual artist based in Berlin. She was born in Cuxhaven, Germany, in 1970 and grew up in an artistic family. At the age of 16, she moved to Paris, and went on to study photography and visual communications. During this time, she met Gisèle Freund, who became her mentor. In 1995, Jessica’s passion for photography drew her to New York, where she assisted photographers, pursued her own projects, and lived until 2009.
She is now regarded as one of the most distinguished voices in contemporary photography in Germany, and her photographs are in many prominent art collections. She is represented by galleries in Germany, Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and the United States. In 2012, FOAM Fotografiemuseum, Amsterdam, produced the shortdocumentary Wonder Jessica Backhaus, by Willem Aerts.
To date, Jessica has nine publications to her name, including Cut Outs, Far Away But Close, A Trilogy, Six Degrees of Freedom, and Once, Still and Forever. In 2024, her latest publication, Plein Soleil, was released by Kehrer Verlag.

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