Steffen Diemer’s thematic focus is quite consistently on still life. The French call it “nature morte,” which sounds very much like a cemetery. Still life sounds better, earthlier, emphasizing the idea that a piece of life has been paused and taken out of circulation for closer examination. Indeed, Steffen Diemer stands in a long artistic tradition, joining a proud iconography that reached its peak with the Dutch in the 17th century. Assembling household items into so-called “banketjes” and transferring them to canvas corresponded to the bourgeois joy of the material world, the here and now, abundance, and representation. The monochrome arrangements of artists like Willem or Pieter Claesz have inspired photographer Steffen Diemer, even though he contrasts the richly set tables of post-1600 painters with a decisive reduction, sometimes emptiness, and always humility. Diemer’s gaze is more focused, concentrating on the object as an individual. It's not about technical excellence in the sense of mimesis, which has become a given with the invention of photography. It's about perception, deep seeing, pausing, and studying—what Roland Barthes called “studium.” Steffen Diemer avoids the “punctum,” the event, the decisive moment.

- Exerpt from Essay on Steffen Diemer by Hans-Micheal Koetzle