Creating instead of gawking
10/26/2023
It's familiar: there's been a major accident in the opposite lane and there's a traffic jam in your own lane. This is because far too many drivers have to at least marvel at and sometimes even take photos of the pile-up. Because this is not only annoying, but above all morally questionable, the Dresden-based photographer Amac Garbe has created his "Accident Cars" series.
Since 2009, he has been transforming Siku toy cars into wrecks that are as badly damaged as they are extremely realistic. This is not only interesting from a model-making point of view, as the thick-walled cast zinc bodies are subject to completely different forces than the large thin sheet metal models with their crumple zones and sometimes require extensive use of tools to achieve a correct damage pattern.
Above all, however, it is a protest against the tabloid press' accident reporting, which likes to overstep the boundaries of good taste and calls all kinds of self-proclaimed sensationalist reporters onto the scene. Garbe's photographs, on the other hand, allow us to be fascinated with a clear conscience by the brutal aesthetics of a completely destroyed car - guaranteed without traffic jams or personal injury.
