The Photograph

There is this photograph by Michael Schmidt, depicting a girl laid out on a table. I saw it for the very first time at Eleni Koroneou’s Art Forum in Greece. This was in 1996 and the photograph was valued at around 1,000 deutsche marks [approximately $700]. At the time, I was doing an internship and didn’t have the money to buy it. When I finally got to a point where I was able to pay for it, I couldn’t find it. The photograph then appeared two or three years ago at Galerie Nordenhake in Berlin. I called them and tried buying it, but it had already been put aside for a collector from New York. He hadn’t paid for it yet but did so after having received word from the gallery of my interest in buying it.

I’ve been waiting for this particular photograph for 20 years and a m...