The man is difficult to categorize. Is Pit Bühler a tenacious loner in search of the perfect motif? A photographer celebrated abroad? A hidden, satisfied doer? Or a misunderstood artist? The man from Baar shoots photos of Uma Thurman in passing, is in the studio with Lee Perry, has won various international awards, knows the world's best clowns and ballet dancers personally. He has photographed them all. Then he flies to Russia, travels twelve hours by train into the pampas to Byransk Oblast to work on a portrait series about Russian cowboys. Bühler staged them as if they were Hollywood stars. «You can still see the Russian in them,» says Bühler. Despite their hats, hairy chests and denim dungarees. He gets them to pose without understanding a word of what they are saying, and vice versa. Then he comes to St. Petersburg and sees himself in the newspaper and on a billboard. And if he just wants to photograph a clown in the circus, the whole circus is on the mat, all made up. They know he's coming. Bühler is now holding a major exhibition in Unterägeri. His clown series is being shown to the public for the first time in the town hall and in two school buildings. That fits. Bühler has no noticeable attitude, no airs and graces, instead an honorable strong drive - and healthy sarcasm to dampen the drive somewhat. He simply finds the clowns interesting. Still does. «It's an incredibly exciting character. When you look at the clown, you get the feeling that there's something wrong with him,» says Bühler. Why is he smiling at me like that? Why is he behaving like that? Why does he want to make people laugh every day? «It's always been like that, even the court jesters in the Middle Ages were ambivalent characters. Even small children often react to clowns by crying,» says Bühler. «Because they are so strange, so unfamiliar.»

Cake, water pistol, no romanticization

Bühler is interested in the masquerade. The transformation into a character that is no longer entirely human because it is so exaggeratedly human. «Look what they do on stage: they hit each other, they fall over, they throw cakes in each other's faces, they shoot each other with water pistols. That's also a form of violence against themselves that takes place to please the audience.» Bühler is not a circus freak and does not romanticize his clowns. «I don't just do it because I think the circus is fantastic. It's because I'm so interested in artists and clowns as characters. Look at this one,» he says and pulls out a picture of a celebrated clown. «He comes from a clown dynasty. His father was already a clown, and so was his father. Tonito is his name - a clown name from birth.» Other parents want their children to become lawyers or bankers. «And then you're born into a family like that, and it's clear that you'll carry on the tradition and be a clown too.» And a good one - one of the best. «These people have an incredible I have a talent for making people laugh.»

Flat-pressed, but larger than life

Bühler's portraits are strong, the images manage to touch the viewer in a fraction of a second. Even when pressed flat, his clowns are larger than life in their expression. Bühler usually has almost no time for the picture. He has to fit in the in-between times, after the make-up and before the curtain rises. «Sometimes I have three minutes,» says Bühler. Then he sets up his portable black background and begins his work, sometimes only taking a handful of shots. «I like the imperfectly perfect. I prefer it when the clown still has a bead of sweat on his forehead from the performance or the tension before the performance on his face.»

Photos while you can

The clown series has been years in the making. Bühler has worked his way up, sought out contacts, found access. «Over time, they get to know you and know what you do,» he says. Then it becomes easier. But also more difficult. Suddenly everyone wants to be in the photo. That's the whole circus. «Then you just take photos while you can. I also want to give something back and don't want to reject people.» Bühler is successful with his way of doing things. He has the Russian ballet icons in the

Moscow Bolshoi Ballet, the pictures hang prominently in St. Petersburg. His more commercial photographs sometimes look as big as houses from billboards in Tokyo. He takes the clowns and cowboys for himself. «I read about the Russian cowboys in the Wall Street Journal. About how Texan cowboys were flown to Russia especially to teach the Russians traditional cattle breeding with horse and lasso,« he says and laughs, »I thought, that's so crazy, I have to go there, I'm sure it will make a wonderful series of portraits.«

Fall in love in three minutes

It is the excitement, the unknown and curiosity that attract him. The clown is funny and always tragic at the same time. Some of his clowns are rather introverted in real life, some are depressed, are sometimes on trial, have a life theme that is closely connected to their clowning and can be recognized in his pictures. His ballerinas are sometimes just as friendly in direct encounters as they look in the picture. Or just as condescending. «It's important to be able to fall in love with the person standing in front of the camera in those three minutes, but also to show respect and accept the necessary distance,» says Bühler. «But even if it doesn't work out, the picture can be good. If there is tension because the moment is terrible.» Infatuation and tension. Curtain up, ring free, for the best clowns in the world.