Günter Derleth - In the course of time

We have activated the window front for the "Display" series. It offers an additional platform for artistic presentations. At irregular intervals, we invite artists to perform in this area, which is visible from the outside and independent of the interior.

After working as an advertising photographer, Günter Derleth (*1941 in Nuremberg) turned to free-form photography and the camera obscura. He has exhibited photographs of his travels, self-made pinhole cameras and photograms from his own garden in numerous exhibitions and award-winning photo books. In 2018, he was awarded the special prize for culture by the city of Fürth.
The camera obscura is like "Hans in Luck" in the fairy tale of the same name. You give up everything and still end up richly endowed. Because the aspects of the pinhole camera, which manages without a lens or viewfinder, are technical reduction, chance and time. Günter Derleth, who began working with the pinhole camera in 1993, dispenses with the use of photographic innovations and rejects any claim to perfection. Instead, he achieves images of enchanting simplicity and atmospheric beauty.
The Fürth-based artist uses self-made pinhole cameras, for which everything from matchboxes to walk-in rooms have been used. In this case, the photograph was taken in an espresso can, which the artist fitted with a small hole and mounted behind the fence of his garden facing south. For eight months, from spring to autumn, the light fell through the small opening into the inside of the can onto the photographic paper mounted inside and recorded the surroundings in front of it - and with it the course of the sun in luminous arcs rising ever further above the horizon. The photograph, which is only about 12 x 9 cm in size, also magically captures the passing and blurring of time. The fact that a coloured image was created on the black and white photographic paper is a welcome surprise for Günter Derleth, adding a further, literally magical layer to the camera obscura. Fitting the motif of a landscape into the two divided façade windows reverses our perception of inside and outside.

Last edited on 16.04.2026