Lounge

„Originally, this lounge had a supervisor named Hildegard, a former flight attendant and a relic from the colorful 70s, who had somehow ended up working for the ground staff. She controlled entry. Since her admission criteria, which she perceived as humane, weren't always aesthetically or ideologically sound, the concept had to be changed. Hildegard is now retired.

The lounge is a portrait gallery. The individual works shown here were created and are created from photographs taken with various analog and digital cameras, or as screenshots, and layered or enhanced through multiple exposures. I only incorporate images into this digital texture that fit thematically or as motifs with the overall concept.

Each individual image had a documentary purpose, capturing a fleeting moment in time. Together, they now represent something that didn't exist in that form."

Till Heene, December 2025

Analogue Outreach 2, or: Widow Ihringer and the Dying Gaddafi

"What remains as a manageable universe: the garden and the house, the living room and the television. The latter brings the world inside. When enough is enough, and even insomnia can no longer keep you going, you switch both off or fall asleep to them.

The connecting element is a color cast like analog sepia. It is probably the image of that sky from March 2022, colored by desert sand from the Sahara stretching from southern to central Europe."

Analogue Outreach 1, or: The Prophet in the Lending Library

"It's a common complaint among older people to become invisible to those around them. Many take the offensive and hide themselves away.
This old man, however, went to the public library of a small Spanish town. 
(Incidentally, the lending library clientele!)
He also saved on heating costs. He borrowed my pen and scribbled an explanation of his increased utility bill on the newspaper. Then, to put it politely, he cursed the government.

Do not go gentle into that good night."

Young Man in River Landscape

May you never know hunger
May you always quench your thirst
May you sleep when you're tired
And then wake up with the birds
And the things that make you happy
Will bring you sadness
Bring you heartache
How will we learn from our mistakes
If we never let them show?
And we'll follow the river
Until our days are through
And they'll never ever
Take your dreams away from you

Travis, The River, 2024

"It's easy to copy and quote. Many philosophers have philosophized, poets have sung, and bards have mused about the idea that life is a river. So often, in fact, that the metaphor has become rather stale.
This dream could also be a dream of waking up. Of opening one's eyes and seeing. Of realizing that one has no clue, but can see.
If dreaming is connected to falling asleep, I'd rather stay awake."

Protection

"As close as possible. Thank you both.""

Terminal Calypso

"She sits there in the arrivals lounge, waiting.
Delayed is displayed next to the flight number and arrival time.

Time to clarify that a few things have changed. First: Odysseus is no longer wandering aimlessly. He's flying commercial, he's a pilot for a scheduled airline. Second: his confusion stems, if at all, from the delay. Otherwise, he's perfectly clear-headed. Responsibility for three hundred souls and more, autopilot or not. Third: had he been on time, she might have tempted him, but all in perspective. A dress, summer perfume, a bit dolled up. There are rumors that the airline wants to discontinue the route. Would Odysseus still come to this island purely for personal reasons? Zeus: the modern network planning of an airline?
How profane it all has become. The tension is gone when myth meets technology. Homo Faber.

A long wait for news via the airport's PA system or her smartphone, but Odysseus remains in airplane mode.
Calypso looks and observes the arrival area. What she thinks about is speculative and at best a projection."

Fernando Pessoa (for a moment without heteronyms)

"A photographer captured Fernando Pessoa in the late (?) 1920s outside a Lisbon fashion house, clutching a booklet (or perhaps a book?). A dozen or so historical photographs exist, including official ones from a contemporary studio and a wonderfully stylized portrait of the sensitive poet. The others are low-contrast images by unknown photographers.

There are no photographs of Pessoa's heteronyms: Alberto Caeiro, Álvaro de Campos, Ricardo Reis, Bernardo Soares, and others. This raises the question of whether they ever actually existed. A symposium is held on this topic, where many insightful points are made, but the fundamental problem remains unresolved.

Fernando Pessoa was largely unknown in German-speaking countries for a long time. It wasn't until the 1980s and 90s that his works (or those of his heteronyms?) were translated. He was considered a hidden gem for those searching for identity.
How disappointed I was when I first came to Portugal with Interrail. Fernando Pessoa adorned the 100 Escudo coins and banknotes. Thus, this ghost was cast out not by his heteronyms, but by the gravel. Only with the introduction of the Euro did the specter end."