Claudia Angelmaier was born in 1972 in Göppingen, Germany. She studied art history at Technische Universität Berlin, receiving an MA in 2001, and went on to study photography at Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig, where she received a diploma in fine art/photography in 2006. The artist then pursued postgraduate studies. Taking art historical masterpieces—and, by extension, art history itself—as her referents, Angelmaier traces the photographic representation of artworks across the pages of textbooks, classroom slides, coffee table monographs, and postcards. Cognizant that major artworks are most often encountered via reproduction rather than in person, she highlights the analogue media that have facilitated the circulation of such images for many decades. Angelmaier’s first major body of work, the series Plants and Animals (2004), depicts arrangements of art books opened to different reproductions of the same work by iconic German artist Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528). Hase (2004), from this series, shows multiple images of a Dürer watercolor of the same name, the repetition emphasizing wide variations in color, scale, and resolution. These inconsistencies illustrate the limits and contingencies of photographic reproduction and, in turn, the imperfect circumstances under which artworks are most often seen. The larger scope of Angelmaier’s concerns is particularly evident in the series Works on Paper (2008– ). Here, the artist photographs the backlit versos of postcards from museum gift shops. The artwork pictured on a card’s front appears muted yet faintly discernible, while the caption information and museum insignia on the back remain fully legible. By foregrounding the text, logos, and barcodes, Angelmaier not only examines the material realities of the postcard, but the social and economic systems both the souvenir and the work it depicts inhabit. In the series Portrait (2013–14), two photographic reproductions of an iconic figurative sculpture, such as Michelangelo’s David (1501–04), are superimposed. The juxtaposition of images reveals slight differences in perspective, underscoring the inherent inadequacy of using a two-dimensional medium to render a three-dimensional object. Angelmaier’s work has been featured in solo exhibitions at Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig (2007); Landesgalerie Linz, Oberösterreichische Landesmuseum, Linz, Austria (2009); and Münchner Stadtmuseum, Munich (2011). Group shows include Déjà-vu? The Art of Repetition, Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe, Germany (2012); The Marseillaise/Fifteen years of collecting, Huis Marseille, Museum voor Fotografie, Amsterdam (2014); (Mis)Understanding Photography: Works and Manifestos, Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany (2014); and Photo-Poetics: An Anthology, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2015), among others. Angelmaier lives and works in Berlin.