…»Laurenz Berges is a chro­ni­cler of absence. In his series of empty bar­racks of Soviet tro­ops in the for­mer GDR, or in his pic­tures of hou­sing which has had to be aban­do­ned by its resi­dents because brown coal mining in wes­tern Germany has reached the sett­le­ments, the pho­to­gra­pher has con­cen­tra­ted on the por­tra­yal of spaces where there are no people. These images report in a redu­ced and cool way on poli­ti­cal and eco­no­mic forces which lead to major con­se­quen­ces for the people affec­ted. Berges is a see­ker of tra­ces who com­ple­tely relies upon the details in his pho­to­graphs achie­ving great effect when we view them. In his new work, too, he devo­tes him­self with great care to the signi­fi­cance of what is appa­r­ently trivial.

His appa­r­ently mini­ma­list pho­to­graphs refer to the ear­lier use of spaces depic­ted only in details. Their resi­dents have put them to ano­ther use.

Berges shows us this change in arid pho­to­graphs which, because they are greatly redu­ced, tell their story only indi­rectly and almost grud­gin­gly. This story tells of the exis­ten­tial mea­ning of cer­tain spaces for our iden­tity, but also of their tran­si­ence and their loss. We can under­stand Berges‹ pho­to­graphs as a refu­sal of the expec­ta­ti­ons of quick legi­bi­lity that are con­ti­nu­ally made of pho­to­gra­phy. The with­dra­wal of infor­ma­tion leads to con­cen­tra­tion on the image-language of his pho­to­graphs. With his insis­tence on deve­lo­ping fur­ther the for­mal lan­guage of pho­to­gra­phy, Berges frees him­self from purely docu­men­tary pre­ten­si­ons. His vacant images throw us back on our­sel­ves. We first have to regain trust to believe them.«

in: Click Double Click – the docu­men­tary fac­tor, Cologne 2006, p 42–43