Fragile Balance

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November 21, 2025

Thomas Wrede: Football Pitch, 2008

The exhibition White was the Snow with works by German photography artist Thomas Wrede continues at the Leica Gallery Düsseldorf until January 10, 2026.

At the heart of the exhibition is a long-term project Thomas Wrede has been pursuing since 2018: White was the Snow addresses the disappearance of alpine glaciers – and the ongoing attempts to slow their retreat with insulating layers of fleece. Wrede’s works move between documentary observation and artistic orchestration. In his images, glacier landscapes are transformed into surreal stage sets, draped in once-white sheets of synthetic fleece – now crumpled, torn, and streaked with dirt. Places such as the Rhône Glacier in the Swiss Alps or the Presena Glacier in northern Italy become metaphors for the fragile balance between nature and artifice, hope and decline.

Another element of the exhibition is the series Real Landscapes (2004 – 2014), which earned the photographer international acclaim. The large-format images make us question our ability to distinguish reality from fiction: what initially looks like an ordinary landscape is, on closer inspection, revealed to be an artfully arranged miniature model that has been embedded into a real-life outdoor scene. The proportional discrepancies between this man-made artifice and the natural world give rise to a conceptual tension that is continued in White was the Snow.

Katrin Ullmann

Thomas Wrede: Football Pitch, 2008