Neven Allgeier

Fading Temples

“An ice block shines translucent, black sand flows over the skin.”

The photographs of Neven Allgeier (b. 1986 in Wiesbaden; lives and works in Frankfurt/Main and Vienna) are sensual, indirect, and full of warmth. They afford viewers an intimate glimpse into the scenes and subcultures that the artist witnesses and captures on his travels: portraits flooded with light encounter diffuse nature shots. An anonymous hotel room in Moscow closed off to the public in February 2022 becomes the backdrop, white Tabi boots a lost prop, light peters out in the hallway. Allgeier plays with these dualities and formal analogies between the photographed subjects and objects, the image of alternative youth cultures, and a world that shapes itself.

Fading Temples tells of transience, of a subversive life, of emptiness and decay, of a present that doesn’t recognize itself and seeks its own image in a kaleidoscopic multiplicity. This large-format artist’s book brings together works from the last five years. With essays by Kate Brown, Benedikt Fischer, Seda Pesen, and Wolfgang Ullrich.

Allgeier published his first photo book Portraits in 2021 (Distanz Verlag). His work is regularly featured in magazines such as ZEIT Magazin, i-D Magazine, and SPIKE Art Quarterly, and has been exhibited at the Museum Angewandte Kunst Frankfurt and the Bonner Kunstverein, among others.