Klaus Gerhart - Art - Critical Assessment

Critical Assessment

Gerhart is a self-taught photographer. Much of his early development as an artist came during a period when single-lens reflex cameras (SLRs) and cameras with automatic metering and focusing were uncommon. Consequently, Gerhart's photography exhibits the knowledge and skill levels of a manual photographer with a wide range of experience. His images often feature a wide range of grain, and he experiments extensively with exposure and fill lighting. Depth of field is an important aspect of his work, and soft focus is used only minimally. Compared with photographers who are more reliant on modern photographic technology, Gerhart's work exhibits a much wider range of artistry.

Gerhart's personal vision as a photographer, however, tends to be less expansive.

For example, Gerhart's models are rather uniform in look. Gerhart is clearly a fan of muscular, well-toned, handsome Caucasian men. Models of who are not very muscular and very well-toned also very rarely appear in his images. Gerhart goes so far as to regularly work with gay pornographic actors such as Derek Cameron, Rob Cryston and others with well-built, highly sculpted bodies.

Additionally, Gerhart seems overly fond of desert settings in his work. Gerhart has a fixation with cacti, sandstone rocks, waterfalls, deserts and similar settings. A standard motif which appears routinely and repetitively throughout his entire career is a model, flexing his muscles, standing on a sandstone boulder or rocky outcropping. Derisively known as the 'jocks on rocks' school of erotic male photography, these settings limit the range of emotion brought to the photography by both artist and model. While popular with the public, contexts such as these, repetitively used, detract significantly from the impact of Gerhart's work. In this regard, however, Gerhart is in good company: Highly-regarded photographers such as Herb Ritts, Tom Bianchi, Steven Underhill, Henning von Berg, Bruce Weber and others also overutilize such settings.

Despite these criticisms, Klaus Gerhart nevertheless manages to retain an edginess in his artwork. By its very nature, the subject of homosexuality is transgressive. Klaus Gerhart clearly positions his models as homosexuals (naked, sexual homosexuals at that).

Additionally, Gerhart is willing to confront the sexuality of homosexuality. Gerhart is much more willing to display full-frontal male nudity, even sexual arousal, in his work than peers such as Ritts, Weber or Underhill. This indicates a willingness to challenge social norms and prevailing notions of taste in stronger terms than many of the more tame, if more mainstream, photographers with whom he is often compared.

The overall assessment of Gerhart's work, then, is that it is technically superior. While his work often shows a lack of visual artistry, even a mundaneness, his art retains a transgressive aspect that is refreshing and helps lift his work above the commonplace.