Erwin Olaf: Stages

A memorial exhibition catalog highlighting the performance-inspired and staged works of one of the Netherlands’ most acclaimed photographers

Dutch photographer Erwin Olaf emerged onto the Amsterdam photography scene in his early 20s. His first formal self-portrait shows influence from New York artists such as Andy Warhol and Robert Mapplethorpe, while also signaling the signatures of his aesthetic throughout his career: layering props and details in open-ended narrative relationships, leading viewers to fantasize about what story is being told. Throughout the 1980s, Olaf became a well-known and well-loved artist and gay rights activist in the Netherlands, photographing drag queens, bodybuilders, fetishists and celebrities at discotheques and other performances. Olaf’s artwork illuminated and celebrated underground scenes, claiming a spotlight for LGBTQ+ identities that expanded everyday possibilities for gay people throughout the Netherlands.
This volume includes a selection of key series centered on the concept of performance, a recurring theme in the artist’s four-decade career. In particular, it delves into Olaf’s intimate and formal relationship with dance. The artist discussed ballet as a major source of inspiration for his personal work, in particular the precision and tension between beauty and gritty strength the genre requires. Olaf’s final completed series, Dance in Close Up (2022), represents a collaboration between the artist and choreographer Hans van Manen, celebrating their shared vision of evocative gesture and the gifts of the stage.
Erwin Olaf was born in the Netherlands in 1959, and died there in 2023. His work is held in permanent collections such as the Rijksmuseum; the Fonds National d’Art Contemporain, Paris; and the Museum Ludwig, Cologne; and also circulates on the Dutch Euro coin.