"Trocknende Tafel"

gelatin silver print, selenum toned

signed, dated, titled and numbered (pencil) on verso

In Trocknenden Tafel the camera's point of view remains unchanged, Simak depicts the process of drying a wet board. He thus documents time – in contrast to other works in the series Kontakabzüge such as the Zaun Sequence in which Simak unfolds time in space by moving his point of view.
(Christoph Fuchs)

Pupils spend years staring at the blackboard in class, but it only becomes visually intriguing when there’s no obvious reason to do so: abstract, ever-changing shapes appear as soon as the board is wiped with a damp sponge. The bright, chalked surface turns into a dark, wet one, then a white-grey one.
I was determined to capture this process in all its glory. A classmate inquired as to my intentions, understood what I meant, and was kind enough to wipe the blackboard for me.
The result wasn’t bad, but I hadn’t taken enough pictures. I was also put off by the reflections of classroom lights and the musical staves on the top half of the blackboard (a must-have for a secondary school specialized in music). So, I decided to try again on another day after the last lesson, when the classroom was empty. I didn’t want any spectators who might not have understood what I was doing or would have thought I was a bit unhinged. I started by scribbling on the board with lots of chalk, then wiping it off as sloppily as possible with a relatively damp sponge. I worked out the time between shots by timing how long it took for the board to go from wet to completely dry, then dividing by 36.
I repeated the process from the beginning, taking care to press the shutter 36 times at the right intervals. I finished by cutting the developed film into 6-frame strips and making a contact print.
The basic idea – to set up the camera, press the shutter and see what happens – is a nod to Andy Warhol. Excerpts from his film Empire (1965) fascinated me early on.
(Fritz Simak, Photographs in the Key of Life, Salzburg 2025, p. 244)