In his photographic work Ingo Hampe explores the mysteries of life and what it takes to be human. In his artistic practice, photographing is an act of sensing and making sense of the world through observation.
He focuses on capturing the beauty of the mundane and candid moments. His images aims to appeal directly to the heart of the viewer.
Vision
Photography is for Ingo Hampe a practice in self-abandonees – a kind of zen meditation:
It is a tool to be present in the moment and be aware of the surroundings. In his work he aspires to create images that have a natural look and an authentic energy.
In 2022 he began to integrate mindfulness more deeply into his photographic work.
He focused on creating images that have a transformational power, where the personality of the subject shines through and the viewers gets a sense of the mood, so that they can engage with the images on an emotional level.
Journey
Ingo Hampe is a self thought photographer who now lives and works in Berlin and London.
He started photography at the age of fourteen when he got his first camera – a Minox point and shoot film camera. With it he took pictures of his travels and at punk rock shows of the bands he liked.
He taught himself the craft with a Minolta SRT 101 – an analogue SLR where he had to set everything manually from focus to aperture. As a street photographer he looked for the decisive moment to capture a story within the picture. He trained his eye to look for leading lines, layers and frames.
Currently he works with a Fujifilm XT-3 because he is familiar with the ergonomic of the camera. His love for the analogue experience never stopped. Lately he got himself a Mamiya C3 Professional. 6×6 medium format film camera. He likes how the limitation of the technology slows down his working process and makes him look more precisely and create a more intimate picture that leave an emotional impact.
influences
The exhibitions: How You Look At It (Sprengel Museum, Hannover 2000) and Das Versprechen Der Photographie (Kestner Gesellschaft, Hannover 1999) introduced to him the work of Gary Winograd, William Eggleston, Lee Friedlander.
These American street photographers inspired him to portray the everyday people, pay attention to subjects that are often overlooked or seemed to be forgotten and document the ordinary life
Peter Lindbergh and Sibylle Bergemann are two photographers he also admires and who inspired him to expand the boundaries of a genre and give them a twist of his own.
He transferred these experiences into his work today, as he is aiming for natural looking pictures that have a natural look and an authentic energy.
Conscious photography
In 2020 Ingo Hampe’s interests shifted to visual story telling. He studied narrative photography and therapeutic photography.
In his recent work, the portraits are no longer about capturing the essence of the person – if that is possible at all – but to perceive something that in each of us and make it visible – our shared humanity. He aspires the viewer to engage with the image on an emotional level and let the image unfold its transformational power.
His photography became a tool for self-discovery, personal development, and identity form through visual narratives.