Zurich,  October 26th 1981 

I called the Zurich City Hall to ask about the application documents for the atelier "Artist in Residence" in Genoa. This was fully booked until 1983, but from 1 January 1982 the studio in Paris (Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris) was available. I have already made some capers. When this happens I am overjoyed.
The day after tomorrow I go with my photographs and the application to Mr. Müller, (Zurich City Hall, responsible for culture) he is quite nice and wants to help me. 

(from my diary).

 

8 seconds
All self-portraits have all been made with the self-timer of my SLR photo camera. This was a special challenge because between the pushing of the trigger and the release of the shutter there were only eight seconds left to slip into the role of the model and taking a pose, which means that there was always also some random moment.
Back in times without autofocus, the sharpness of the images (i.e., to find myself on the focal plane) was more or less a matter of luck. Even an immediate inspection was not possible and the success could only be judged hours later after the (manual) development of the films.