Plate VI, 2022; from the series Plates I–XXXI

During lockdown, the Berlin-based artist Lia Darjes relocated to her parents’ countryside home. In an essay by Jesse Dorris for the spring issue of Aperture magazine, “Photography & Painting,” Darjes reflects on that time: “I was sitting in the garden one day, just thinking, ‘What’s next?’” she recalls. “Then I saw a squirrel jump onto our garden table, and I thought, ‘I wonder if I can recreate that.’” Despite her early passion for photojournalism, Darjes has long been seduced by the dramatic artifice of the Dutch vanitas tradition. “I struggled, because I was always interested by still life, but it’s made up—arranged,” she says.

This photograph is part of the series Plates I–XXXI, the imaginative outcome of her first encounter with that neighborly squirrel. Inspired by that moment, she began orchestrating picnics and luncheons on tables in gardens of friends and family. She leaves behind delicate remnants of these meals, subtly coaxing future guests. Their movements, in turn, trigger the camera, which has been left in place for hours or even days. The result is a fairytale-like scene featuring a coal tit whose presence serves as a quiet testament to the space where the natural world and the human world gracefully intersect.

Lia Darjes
Plate VI, 2022; from the series Plates I–XXXI
Archival pigment print
9 1/2 × 11 3/4 in.
Edition of 20 + 3 artist proofs
Printed, signed, and numbered by the artist

Lia Darjes (born in Berlin, 1984) lives and works in Hamburg and Berlin. She studied at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences. Darjes is known for Tempora Morte, a documentary still life study about the small stalls seen at street markets in Kaliningrad, Russia. In 2018, Darjes began teaching photography at the Ostkreuzschule für Fotografie, Berlin, an institution she has ran together with the photographer Jörg Brüggemann since 2023. She is represented by Robert Morat Galerie.