In his multi-part work “40 Years of Christmas,” Reinhart Mlineritsch refers to private family photographs by Kurt Conrad in the archive of the Salzburg Open-Air Museum. Mlineritsch’s first photograph, which depicts the nearly one-year-old son on his mother’s lap in the center, framed by grandparents and sisters-in-law, but without the photographer himself, steps together with his family into the picture in the second installment, standing in front of the Christmas tree. The decision to undertake a long-term study of a family portrait across generations has been made; the aesthetic is determined by the choice of camera, with its rapidly changing technical specifications over 40 years, and continues to this day. An important reference is the series “The Brown Sisters” by Nicholas Nixon, who, since 1975, has photographed a group of four sisters (his wife and three sisters-in-law) annually using a large-format camera. Mlineritsch’s work also shows family history with all its progressions in extreme time-lapse, the initially uncertain outcome of changes within the group, aging itself, and the changing fashions (of consumption) over time. (Text: Fotohof)

Reinhart Mlineritsch: From the series “40 Years of Christmas”, 1981, Archival Pigment Print on baryta paper

Reinhart Mlineritsch: From the series “40 Years of Christmas”, 2020, Archival Pigment Print on baryta paper

Opening of the exhibition SalzburgBilder at Galerie Fotohof, Austria. The video shows Reinhart Mlineritsch’s series “40 Years of Christmas“.

Reinhart Mlineritsch talks about his contribution to the exhibition “SalzburgBilder. Photo Archives of the Salzburg Open Air Museum as a Source of Contemporary Photography” at FOTOHOF in the year 2021: