Arved Gintenreiter
Arved Gintenreiter is a German photographer, born 1975 in Fürstenfeldbruck and based in Malta; he works and lives nomadically.
With a background in economics and journalism, his photography projects mainly discuss social and political issues, based in realism and research, broken down to the essence, and finally transformed into presentations of visual imagination and emotional experience, blurring the lines between documentary and fiction.
His works present a form of emotional storytelling: the combination of classic photography, audio compositions, and text fragments, creates an entertaining experience, provides factual information, and challenges the viewer with philosophical questions elevating current topics to a generalized level of ethics and ideals.
The first decade of his childhood, Arved Gintenreiter grew up abroad, mainly in Pakistan and Turkey. The experience of navigating different cultures with German parents and local workers, curious strangers and multi-national friends, shaped his life in early years: embracing the unknown, overcoming language barriers, adapting to a positive diversity. Photography, as a tool with its own limitations, blends curiosity, storytelling, and bridging cultures.
Soon after returning to Germany for school and education, in his teens he is given an old Minolta SLR by his aunt; the first step into photography. Though developing a passion as a hobbyist, his professional life follows a different path. High school majors in physics and geography, a master’s degree in business economics, traineeship as a journalist, followed by a career as a (writing) reporter, and finally as editor for the departments of economy and foreign affairs at Germany’s leading news agency dpa.
2009 he breaks with his prior professional life and decides to follow his heart and pursue photography. First freelance jobs take him to Ireland, Austria, France, and Egypt. When moving to Italy 2012, he develops a new concept for teaching photography and starts to grow a photography workshop business while working on the Venice Monochrome series, which was exhibited 2015. Afterwards he moves to Iceland part-time for working on his biggest project up to date: Evolibrium.
Throughout his life, Arved Gintenreiter has an interest in storytelling and in relations of humanity; relations among each other as well as with their environment. His photography projects are organized as conceptual audio-visual shows, which can be experienced both online as well as being displayed in an exhibition room.
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1975, Born in Fürstenfeldbruck, Germany |
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1976-81, Pakistan |
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1981-84, Turkey |
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1985, Germany |
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1987, Start playing the cello |
First Minolta SLR, 1988
Still trying to figure out how this thing works, 1989
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1990, Giving up on the cello |
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1991-2001, Fencing takes over (on a line between passion and obsession) |
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1995, Unexpectedly passing high school exams |
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1995-96, Community service |
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1996, Enrolling for Business Economics at Goethe University Frankfurt |
Kitchen sink darkroom, 1998-2003 |
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1999, China travel |
Photography trip to Nepal, 2002 |
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Projection of slide show Nepal, 2003 |
2003, Master’s degree in Corporate Finance, Corporate Organization, and Financial Derivatives |
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2004, Learning Arabic in Damascus, Syria
2004-05, Middle East travels
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2005, Barkeeper in Germany |
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2006, Freelancer for a local newspaper and the news agency dpa
2007, Traineeship as news journalist with dpa
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2008-09, Reporter and editor for news agency dpa in
the departments of Economy and Foreign Affairs |
Freelance photographer, contributing to pa picture-alliance
First job: Ireland EU referendum, 2009
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Freelance photography in Egypt, 2010
Arabic Impressions project, 2010-11
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Freelance photography in France, 2011
Motorbike accident ten days into the project. Learning how impractical both hands in a cast can be. Mastering Photoshop while being impaired
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2012-2017, Venice, Italy |
Developing a new photography workshop concept, 2012
Exhibition Venice Monochrome, 2015
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Working on Evolibrium project, 2015-20 |
2015-17, Splitting time beteween Iceland and Italy |
Totally overwhelmed. Starting to work on two projects in Asia; will they will ever be completed? |
2016, Bangkok, Thailand |
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2017, Moving to Malta |
Living through a not so nice pandemic, 2020 |
2020, Living through a not so nice pandemic |
Exhibition Evolibrium – Transformative Chaos at a Crossroads, 2021 |
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