This little book makes no claim to be a monographic work about Wilhelm Schürmann’s photography. Instead, it sums up our collaboration on various projects and our conversations during recent years, in which a shared enthusiasm for certain themes and shared opinions about books and photographs emerged. I’ve learnt so much about the medium in our several months of cooperation for an extensive monographic publication – produced at the end of 2014 – and in our many discussions of what photography can be. Learning where photography can be art and where it cannot, what photography can be when it isn’t limited to its documentary function. And this was all with humor and no wiseacring, inviting me to participate in his personal views on art and on collecting. Often, while enjoying a good meal in a pleasant ambience, whether in Berlin or Herzogenrath.
Many thanks, Wilhelm Schürmann, and I hope that you will take as much pleasure from this little book as I have – for, as a true birthday gift, it had to be a surprise and so came without your involvement. Happy Birthday!
Roland Angst