Baby Hippopotamus, Gelsenkirchen, Germany 1989

Curator: I'm immediately struck by the heavy feeling of confinement in this photograph. It's so stark. Editor: Indeed. The work we're considering is a photograph titled "Baby Hippopotamus, Gelsenkirchen, Germany." It was taken in 1989 by Volker Seding. Curator: Gelsenkirchen. So, a zoo in Germany then, I assume. You can practically smell the damp concrete through the picture. It feels incredibly lonely and even brutal, really. Look at the bars – they dominate the whole composition. It completely obscures the hippo! Editor: That compositional structure—the bars, the textures of the walls—serves a very precise function. The rigorous verticality of the bars create a foreground plane that distances us. Note also the carefully calibrated tonal contrasts within the photograph. The muted color palette further enhances this feeling. The decay is beautiful here. Curator: The bars create an interesting framing effect, definitely, and the poor thing barely has any room. It makes you question what “public art” really means, when we turn nature into an exhibit. But at the same time, it's beautiful in a strange, heartbreaking way. Do you get what I mean? Editor: I understand. The bars create an immediate boundary but also introduce the central question regarding our relationship with the otherness. We are seeing nature on display, and yet it doesn’t make for very pretty art in that very notion. It asks us how we define that interaction and whether those boundaries should, in fact, exist at all. Curator: It’s heavy, isn’t it? The photo does speak of boundaries and their repercussions, echoing how often such divides feel so... immovable. It really does evoke something almost viscerally unsettling. Editor: Absolutely. "Baby Hippopotamus, Gelsenkirchen, Germany," while appearing simple on the surface, offers a very layered narrative that will make you consider humanity's impact, whether visible or subtle.