The desire for security and belonging is one of the dominant feelings. Everyone is longing for home, but when childhood is gone, one finds it  often in memories, no matter if one has stayed or left. Irina Ruppert came from Kazakhstan to Germany with her family at the age of seven. Now, decades later, she is drawn towards the east. Instinctively, over and over again. Because of the memory – or the idea of it. 
The images in RODINA are just like the concept of home – inconceivable, ephemeral and radically subjective. Two boys coasting down the village street in their soapbox, the hilly, softly illuminated landscape shines in a lush green. In a soup plate lies a chicken foot, a man swings the scythe on a field, a little girl stays in front of a small house with a big cross on the front, grandma sits in the dark, simply decorated living room, a boy interrupts his ride on a far too large bicycle, in order to commune with a goat. Thus we learn something about life in Eastern Europe in that book, about the fundamental impressions, experiences and encounters, which affect a life. I believe it is due to the special quality of Irina Ruppert’s photographs that the images become transparent in the observer’s eye and the frame fills with personal memories.
Publisher's Description

Peperoni Books
64 Seiten 29 Farbabbildungen 21 x 23 cm Hardcover / leinengebundenAuflage 400 EUR 36, Spezialedition with Wallpaper EUR 88
ISBN 978-3-941825-32-1

 

 

Exhibition 09/10

 

Family pictures are memories, a remembrance of childhood and homeland. Three photographers exhibit an examination of mother, sister, aunt – and their own persona  at the Strümpfe-Galerie, Mannheim. Photography by Irina Ruppert, Linn Schröder and Ingo Taubhorn.

First night 3rd Sept. 2010, 20:00 hrs

Strümpfe – The Supper Artclub
68159 Mannheim
Jungbuschstr. 3
Telefon: 0621/86251047
www.struempfe-jungbusch.de

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New Edition 01/10

 

 „Zigeunerkirche “

Print size 30 x 40 cm Ed. of 25 + 2 A.P. archive

pigment print on baryt paper signed and numbered
 

To pre-order please contact: Misha Kominek

 

Kominek Gallery

Immanuelkirchstrasse. 25

10405 Berlin

Tel. 0157-71 44 18 41

email: misha@kominek-gallery.com

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LFI- Leica International 02/2009

In search of the Soul
by Christian Schüle

Irina Ruppert and I have travelled together three times: to Russia, Turkey and, most recently, Romania ... In her view, a photograph has to be the result of a genuine relationship with the individual or group she is looking to portray. The photographer and the subject have to feel safe and at ease.... I would describe Irina’s approach to photography as humanism in action. She feels her way into a situation like few other people I know.... Irina Ruppert’s photographs are soulful and immediately recognisable. They speak of essence. Even her snapshots will convey a sense of the greater experience within which they were taken, along with a hint of the eternal. Her work is never overloaded, never burdened with detail for detail’s sake. If there are people in the picture, their faces reflect the circumstances of their lives. If landscapes are the motif, the vastness and silence are imbued with an incredible feeling of transcendence. There is no intention to convince or persuade, no desire to make a statement or cause anger. The pictures invite us to day-dream. Sometimes the effect can be metaphysical. As though guided by a mysterious inner compass, Irina Ruppert almost always travels east – in search of her childhood, I suspect.

With 15 Photography by Irina Ruppert

 www.lfi-online.de

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New Edition

The image „Balkanblock“ (2008), part of the series „Danube“, is now available for collectors – the limited amount of 30 prints can be ordered from july on. The photographs are signed, numbered and printed by hand on 40.6 x 50.8 Kodak glossy paper.

 To pre-order please contact:
Michael Klein-Reitzenstein
Buchhandlung im haus der photographie
Deichtorhallen Hamburg GmbH
Deichtorstr. 1-2
D-20095 Hamburg

Tel:  0049(0)40  32 52 87 04 / 06  Fax: 0049(0)40  32 52 87 05
email: bookshop@deichtorhallen.de

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Publication

du – Zeitschrift für Kultur no. 777 (June 2007)

Danube. River of nations

For several thousand years the Danube river has been the setting for European history. Passing through ten countries, it has brought together people and civilisations of different customs, religions and languages ever since. With Romania and Bulgaria having joined the EU on 1 January 2007, eight of the adjacent states of the Danube are now in Europe – the Danube, as a European river, connects West and East. Including texts by Christian Schüle, Andrzej Stasiuk, Andreas Nentwich, Eva Demski, Sibylle Lewitscharoff and others.

With 24 colour photographs by Irina Ruppert.
www.dumag.ch
 

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Exhibition

"Wurzeln 2" (Roots 2)

16 January 2007 – 4 March 2007
Zeppelin Museum Friedrichshafen

From 16 January to 4 March 2007, Irina Ruppert shows a selection of photographs, taken during her scholarship in Friedrichshafen. Center stage of her works takes the living situation of young people, growing up in different cultural surroundings. For her series "Wurzeln 2"  (Roots 2) the photographer from Hamburg took pictures of more than ninety young people aged thirteen to twenty. "I asked young people, who I had formerly met in schools, youth centres or in the street, to choose from a selection of ten to fifteen textiles a particular one, that in their opinion symbolises their country of origin. They would then be photographed in front of it."
Catalogue: ISBN:978-3-86136-112-1

www.kulturstiftung.zf.com