Claudia Reinhardt *1964 in Viernheim/Germany lives and works in Berlin and Oslo. She is a photographer, painter, videoartist and worked as a professor at the National Academie of the Arts, Bergen/Norway. Romina Achatz talkes with her about her project “Killing Me Softly – Todesarten”, “No Place like home”, “Tomb of love” and her new project “LOVE 2018”. The conversation is about her art, love, suicide and a place called home.

Here is a describtion of the project Killing me softly:
“It was the suicide of Sarah Kane in 1999 which first started my preoccupation with the subject female artists who killed themselves. Sarah Kane, a britsh writer, committed suicide at the age of 28. At that point she had written only five theaterplays but was already famous worldwide. Her death was a shock for me. I just noticed her work few month before she died and I was deeply impressed and touched by her writtings. I couldn`t get her death out of my mind. I realized that many other female artists who are important for me, my work and my live, committed suicide as well. I had to deal with that and as an artist working with staged photos – often with myself – I started with the series which I called “Killing Me Softly- Todesarten”. In these photos I tried to imagine their last moment and photographed myself in the roles of these personalities. My subjective sympathies and my interest in the work and biographies of the artists determined the selection of the particular death scenes recreated. What was important was the staging of these photos, not at all an authentic depiction of the act itself, but rather the personal creation of a legend, one based on bygone legends. Throughout this project, a discussion and collaboration with the authors in the book began whom I am connected to both in spirit and in friendship.”