“Harf Zimmermann’s pictures show views of the world that come together harmoniously.

The revelation of the real and the act of perceiving it are transposed into an order framed by the relationship between proximity and distance, surface and detail, motif and chromatic power. Zimmermann combines the momentary and the pictorial in such a way that each image becomes an argument against rigidification. To the extent that nothing seems to happen, time is presented as historical meaning, universally accessible and at the same time eluding definition. The strict composition of the image releases multiple possibilities of seeing, in an abundance bordering on excess.

So, what have we got here? The implications of the title go beyond the standard question familiar from police procedural fiction, when the investigators arrive at the crime scene – that much is obvious. Traditionally, the fascination of such an encounter between emergent reality and the living power of vision is attributed, simply, to the intellect.”

Thilo Billmeier, 2026

CHAUSSEE 36 Photography is pleased to present this exhibition of new work by Harf Zimmermann. Zimmermann is one of the foremost German exponents of large-format photography, using mainly analog film with large and very large cameras. He is a reader of hidden traces in objects that go unnoticed, a master of the unseen, of things – apparently inert – that he translates into light, form and color, and presents, with a sure hand, as the outcome of ongoing, living processes, detailed with the precision of crime scene photographs that make their subject clearly legible. Hence the exhibition’s title, referring to the familiar question of the detective about to begin  an investigation: “So, what have we got here?”

The exhibition features a selection of photographs taken between November 1994 and February 2026 in connection with Zimmermann’s worldwide commissions and his personal artistic projects. Most of the images are shown here for the first time.

The series “BRAND WAND” (Steidl Verlag 2014) and “Hufelandstrasse 1055 Berlin” (Steidl Verlag 2017, from the exhibition of the same title also held in 2017 at C/O Berlin), are his best-known works.

Born in Dresden in 1955, Harf Zimmermann began to train as a journalist before moving to work at a photo laboratory. In the 1980s he studied photography under Arno Fischer at the Academy of Fine Arts in Leipzig. From 1990 to 2000, he was a founding member of the photographic agency OSTKREUZ, and worked for a range of international publications including Stern, Merian, Geo France, Geo, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The New Yorker. He is a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts and the German Society for Photography.

Thursday, Apr 30, 2026, 7 – 9 pm
Opening reception

Berlin Gallery Weekend
Special opening hours:
Friday, May 1 & Sunday, May 3, 2026: 1 – 6 pm

Sunday, May 3, 2026, 3 pm
Curator’s Guided Tour with Thilo Billmeier (en/de)
In presence of the artist. Depending on the participants’ wishes, the tour will take place in German or English.