Professor of Photography & Moving Images, MfA
+49 (0) 176 201 99 860
+49 (0) 176 201 99 860
+49 (0) 176 201 99 860
+49 (0) 176 201 99 860
Karin Jobst is an artist and professor working at the intersection of photography and moving image. Her work explores how images carry time, space and transformation, often developed in complex and process-driven environments.
She holds a Master of Fine Arts in Photography from the Academy of Fine Arts (HFBK Hamburg) and a Diploma (FH) in Photography & Media from Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences. She studied with Katharina Bosse, Silke Grossmann and Wim Wenders.
Her artistic work includes long-term projects developed in specific spatial and infrastructural contexts: a nuclear power plant, a transatlantic container ship journey from Hamburg to New York, and the Niagara Tunnel Project in Canada—one of the largest hydro-engineering constructions in North America. In parallel, she has realized commissioned photographic works in the context of façade construction and complex building processes for major international architectural projects across Europe and North America, including projects by Renzo Piano, Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid and Herzog & de Meuron.
From 2013 she was Professor at HKDM Freiburg, University for Fine Art, Design und Music, which later became part of Macromedia University of Applied Sciences, where she continues to teach photography and moving image.
Her teaching and academic work focus on foundational visual competencies, the relation between still and moving images, and the integration of contemporary technologies, including AI, into artistic and design processes.
Alongside her artistic and academic work, she has taken on roles in academic self-governance and institutional development. She also contributes to selection processes as a trusted reviewer for the Heinrich Böll Stiftung and
is a member of the German Photographic Society (DGPh) and the German Photographic Academy (DFA).
( 01 )
Work
atomar ---zone1
Karin Jobst addresses the architecture of a nuclear power
plant in simultaneously messing with the chemical process
of photography. She creates images that are abstract and
personal at the same time.
Since the commissioning of the first nuclear power plant in Germany, the advantages, disadvantages, risks and applicability of nuclear energy have been discussed on multifarious levels, receiving diverse yet constant publicity. The artist Karin Jobst confronts the sociopolitical topic of nuclear energy in her work atomar ––– zone 1. Her photographs show interior and exterior shots of a German nuclear power plant and grant the observer views of rooms, which otherwise remain barricaded. In her work, Jobst assumes the tradition of industrial photography. In the 1920’s, symbols of the modern industrial age were fostered as the new subject matter of fine art photography. Sharp and detailed depictions of the objects were promoted as a suitable and artistic visual aesthetic, demarcating the then prevalent pictorialism, which aspired to endow photographs with painterly properties.
Artitst book; limited edition with 23 handmade C-prints
H2 – Museum for Contemporary Arts Augsburg, Germany
International Photography Award, The core of industry, special mention, Reggio Emilia, Italy, 2008
Plat(t)form Fotomuseum Winterthur Schweiz, 2008
Audi Art Award, nomination 2008
Detroit for John, Marylou and Mr. Duke
In 2010, artist Karin Jobst arrived for the first time in Detroit from her native Germany. She was not awestruck by the city's empty buildings and depopulated streets, but felt compelled to develop a fresh body of work inspired by Detroit's sense of time, place, and history. Using the medium of photography, she continued working in Detroit through 2012. Select photographs from her numerous visits to the Motor City are the subject of "Detroit for John, Mary Lou and Mr. Duke". Progressive in her conception and presentation of the series, Jobst does not create a city history or interpretation with a clear, linear narrative structure or with regard to formal traditions associated with photography. Without beginning, middle, or end, the images build on a continuum of content and visual information that express Detroit's specificity as a contemporary urban environment.
Selected title German Photo Book Award 2013
Book published by Kehrer, Heidelberg, Germany
Book design by Danielle Aubert, Detroit
Exhibitions: Detroit Institute of Arts, DIA, USA 2012/13
„Motor City Muse: Detroit Photographs, Then and Now“ Robert Frank, Henri Cartier Bresson; Dave Jordano „Foto Europa. 1850 to the Present“ Julia Margaret Cameron, Eugène Atget, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank, Christian Boltanski, Gerhard Richter, Wolfgang Tillmans, Bernd und Hilla Becher, ...
Crossing Niagara Falls, CA/USA
The Niagara Tunnel Project was carried out by STRABAG AG with the world's largest tunnel boring machine from 2006 to 2013. It was commissioned by the Ontario Power Generation after more than seven years of construction. The 10 km long water conveyance tunnel, with a diameter of 14.4m near the Niagara Falls, was recognized as a century-building for hydroelectric power generation.
Karin Jobst photographed the 10km long tunnel just before the completion of the tunneling work and prior to the final flooding with water for power generation. She traced the course of the underground tunnel on the Earth's surface, capturing images of the casinos, streets, and hotels of the Niagara Falls town located directly above the tunnel, all the way to the hydroelectric power station in Canada, across the U.S.-Canadian border.
around heaven and men
In my research, I explore the borderlands of the medial conditions of photography and film. While a serially photographed situation—a moving portrait—is not presented as a cinematic sequence but instead as a seven-panel tableau that spatializes movement like a visual narrative, the portrait shown on 35mm film remains a seemingly static single frame for three minutes.
Only marginally do the smallest changes become visible as perceptual disturbances, pointing back to the medium itself—film—and to the representational spaces that extend beyond the simple portrait into space and time.In addition to engaging with Gilles Deleuze's writings on difference and repetition, the work of Eadweard Muybridge has been a foundational influence on my practice.
Artist book, Text by Alexander Rischer
Photography edition, Materialverlag HFBK Hamburg, 2011
Exhibitions:
Kunsthaus (Arthouse) Hamburg, Germany
Stadtmuseum Munic Germany
Goethe-Institut Prague
Galerie Robert Morat, Berlin
PF Galleries, Detroit, USA
Transatlantic Seaway Hamburg - NYC 2012
As an artist, grandchild and nice of her grandfather and uncle, who traveled in 1928 and 1954 on a ship to New York City, USA seeking employment, Karin Jobst had this dream since years to follow her relatives on the same way to the United States. It was her goal to take photographs every single hour during day and night on her journey of 11 days from Hamburg via Rotterdam to New York City.
So the Laisz Group in Hamburg/Germany invited her generously in May 2012 to come on board on the containership PORTO, which is a midsize vessel who is able carry around 2800 containers.
Transatlantic Containershiptrip Hamburg - New York City
As an artist, grandchild and nice of her grandfather and uncle, who travelled in 1928 and 1954 on a ship to New York seeking employment, Karin Jobst had this dream since years to follow her relatives on the same way to the United States.
It was her goal to take photographs every single hour during day and night on her journey from Hamburg via Rotterdam to New York City. F. Laeisz invited her in May 2012 to come on board of the 2010 built containership MV PORTO, which is a mid size vessel of about 2800 TEU containers.
( 02 )
Exhibitions
2019
100 Jahre Wirklichkeit, Deutsche Fotografische Akademie, Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Germany
2016
Courbusier Revisited, internationaler Museumstag Weissenhofwerkstatt, Mies van der Rohe, Stuttgart, Germany
SCOPE, Fotofestival, Kurator Maik Schlüter, Hannover Germany
Der Andere und der Gleiche, Axel Hoedt, Sara-Lena Maierhofer, u.a (Kuratorin) im Kunsthaus L6 der Stadt Freiburg, Fotobiennale Mulhouse, Germany
2015
Under Surveillance, Galerie für Fotografie _
Ricus Aschemann, Hannover; Kurator: Maik Schlüter
Alec Soth, Bettina Lockemann, ... Hannover, Germany
2013
Foto Europa. 1850 to the Present
Detroit Art Institute _ DIA; USA
Bernd & Hilla Becher, Wolfgang Tillmanns, August Sander, Yves Marchan & Romain Meffre, Christian Boltanski, ...
Kunstverein Wolfsburg, Learning from Detroit
PF Galleries, Clawson MI USA, (solo)
Detroit Art Institute DIA,Motor City Muse, Detroit Photographs Then and Now
Henri C. Bresson, Robert Frank, Dave Jordano, ...
Detroit, USA
2012
Gängeviertel Kunsthaus Speckstrasse Hamburg
Koffer Kunst Chicago + Detroit
2011
Robert Morat Gallery, Hamburg, Germany, 2011
Stadtmuseum Munich, Germany, 2011
2010 - 2005
Kunsthaus Hamburg 2010 MfA, Degreeshow, HfbK
Metropolis Cinema, Hamburg. 2009
International Photography Award, The core of industry, special mention, Reggio Emilia, Italy, 2008
Days of photography, Darmstadt, Museum Künstlerkolonie, Germany, 2008
Plat(t)form, Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland. 2008
Portfoliowalk, special mention, DFA Symposium of the German, Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Germany, 2007
Degreeshow, University of Applied Sciences, Bielefeld, Germany, 2007
ZIFPhotoAward, Aesthetic Center, University Bielefeld, Germany, 2007
Jewish Museum, Augsburg, Germany, 2007
Jewish Museum, Berlin, Germany, 2006
Galerie Novi Hram, Goethe Institute, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, 2006
LCC, London, Great Britain. 2006
Historic Museum, Bielefeld, Germany, 2005
Galerie artists unlimited, Bielefeld, Germany, 2005
2024
Troubled Surface, Delphi Space Freiburg, Germany
Biennale de la Photographie de Mulhouse
2025
Flows: Water, sound, and weather
group exhibition with artists from Chicago, Detroit and Hamburg
MOM art space _ Gängeviertel Hamburg, Germany
Crossing under Niagara Falls, CA/USA
Brooklyn '11
Elbphilharmonie `09
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Wackersdorf `08
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