"The Ulm Beauty"

Instant photograph (Polaroid)

Titled, dated, signed (ink) on verso

On the occasion of her first retrospective, in the Stadthaus Ulm, Irene Andessner chose as her central theme a tableaux vivant with the figure of St Mary Magdalene shown as the sculptor Michel Erhart created her in 1480 for the high altar of Ulm Minster. Rescued after being handed over for burning during the Reformation, then missing for centuries before surfacing in the 19th century in the city beer hall as a female chandelier, brought into the Ulm Museum in 1916 and released from the candelabra antlers in 1934, she was recorded in the city chronicles as the “Schöne Ulmerin” [The Ulm Beauty]. Two large portrait light boxes with video documentation of the performance – is in the Ulm Museum. 
(Irene Andessner)