Frankfurt Classic
2009 – 2014
Stefanie Pretnar

Frankfurt is witnessing construction on a scale unlike anything it has seen in recent years. No one is getting their fingers burnt here with brave experiments in architecture or urban development: Happy Ugly Frankfurt.
Stefanie Pretnar observes the alterations to the fabric of the city from a street photographer’s perspective. Armed with her camera, she traverses the urban space on foot. However, her book denies the reader the pleasure of leafing in peace through a series of well-composed images. The artist interweaves her photographs with pages from the catalogue of the Birkenstock company, which has now become an international concern — the book takes its title from the Birkenstock line of shoes “Frankfurt Classic”. In this way she creates relationships between her movement through the city and this shoe brand, which has long since left its ecological niche and is now mixing it as a global player.