Images from the Secret Stasi Archives
Germany
2020
As digital and technological advancements have made surveillance commonplace, Simon Menner has built a long-term project on the themes of observation, surveillance and camouflage. For four years, he delved into the archives of the Stasi, the dark secret police of former East Germany.
How to wear a wig? How to properly apply a fake moustache? A large part of these images methodically document the art of disguise. Broad and structured, this collection covers all uses of photography applied to spying: covert search operations or catalogues of codes and signals for spies. It can also be used for festivities and bibulous fancy-dress parties! By reclaiming
this mass of images, Simon Menner exposes, with tongue-in-cheek humour, a dark chapter of European history.
With the support of Goethe Institut
Portfolio
About the artist
Simon Menner was born in 1978 in Emmendingen, Germany. He is a graduate of the Berlin University of the Arts and has also studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. He has exhibited internationally in both solo and collective exhibitions, namely at the MOCP in Chicago, CO Berlin, the Benaki Museum in Athens, the Bauhaus Museum, the NRW Forum in Düsseldorf, the MUDAC in Lausanne, the Lubumbashi Biennale and Optica Montreal.