I'm fascinated with Andreas Gursky's work, so much so that I've collected nearly every one of his monographs and watched two documentaries on him several times. He's one of the reasons why I picked up LF photography, if not photography itself.
But, for the life of me, I can't figure out what he's shooting with nowadays. Now I know many people will say "who cares what he shoots with?" But I actually do care. I would love to know what his technique is nowadays, and how it evolved from what it was, say, a decade prior.
As far as I can tell, Gursky uses a Linhof Master Technika, as seen in an article about him doing his 2007 North Korea shots, and a Linhof Technikardan 45s, as seen in the 2009 documentary about him entitled "Long Shot Close Up," as his main LF cameras. He also used a Hasselblad H3DII body with a Phase One P45+ back. In said documentary, you actually see him going through the process of making one of his works, first using a point-and-shoot Leica digital camera to photograph a particular area in general (in this case a gigantic labyrinth where miners store their clothes), then come back later with his Linhof Technikardan 45s with a digital Phase One P45+ back for a "test shoot" of what he actually wants to photograph, then finally come back again with the Linhof Technikardan 45s and the real deal 4x5 Fuji 100 ASA film for the final actual photographic material, photographing a particular area and several more so that he has enough material to edit his final artwork. He then drumscans the processed Fuji transparancied and uses a photo editor to edit and complete his photograph.
But this was now 10 years ago and things have changed.
I know Gursky did love and certainly preferred film, but with the advances in digital imaging, I don't know if that's still the case.
Does anyone here have any insight to what camera and/or techniques he may now be using? He certainly has access to the best of the best, but I still think he shoots in film. Digital still just doesn't look very good. (Look at Edward Burtynsky's latest work, "Anthropocene," and Gregory Credson's work "Cathedral of the Pines." Both were shot with the latest best digital equipment and both look horrible, especially in comparison to their earlier work shot with film.)
Believe it or not, I was crazy enough to email his studio only to be told by his assistant that he's on sabbatical leave from the Dusseldorf Kunstakademie (where he's a professor) and won't be able to answer any questions I had. :/
So what do you guys know?
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