10 years ago this week, we wrapped our first Abstract shoot with one of my best friends, Christoph Niemann. Berlin: gear cases over cobblestone, a camera in the median, gaff + grip shaping light; sound chasing thoughts before they evaporate.
Christoph and I met in 2000, when I was a 23-year-old art director at
@texasmonthly and he was already CHRISTOPH: restless, brilliant, unmistakably himself. We collaborated for years in that old way: landlines, long conversations, the thrill of making something out of thin air.
So when Abstract started to take shape, Christoph wasn’t just “a subject.” He was my first call. The first yes I needed. I asked him to trust me, and to trust that Morgan Neville and Dave “DOC” O’Connor and a still-forming crew would honor his process, not flatten it.
Late February 2016:
@maxgoldmandp as our cinematographer, ferocious, designing frame by frame.
@marcellaofaventine producing, the engine: call sheets, timing, pivots, meals, movement. A studio packed with bodies and light. A crane arm floating over Christoph’s desk. Neon at Paris Bar. And a booth table where Christoph drew while the rest of us tried not to breathe too loud.
Long days. Short daylight. Constant resets. Wrap dark. Do it again.
That week became a hinge in my life. We didn’t fully know how we were going to make Abstract when we arrived. By the time we left, because of Christoph’s creativity, generosity, and humility, we did. Back in New York, DOC and Justin Wilkes and a team started building what would become our first season, while
@billysorrentino was back in San Francisco shaping our visual language.
And then we built again. We submitted Christoph’s episode to Sundance as the cleanest signal of the show’s intent. We submitted
@tinkahat ’s too—Portland as an echo of Berlin—another set of days, another act of trust with another brother.
10 YEARS LATER, I’m moved by what Abstract gave me: friendship as creative infrastructure. Trust as a medium. And proof that showing the messy truth of designing things can help people make them.
To everyone who’s followed along since the show came out, thank you. Your notes and stories have been sustaining.
Danke, Christoph—always.💛
