Although mostly known for his book releases (see below), Niermann earlier contributed to German newspapers Sueddeutsche Zeitung and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. He has also conducted interviews for German literary magazine Der Freund and contributed a series of interviews labelled Die Beste aller Welten [~ “The best of all worlds imaginable”] to the German art magazine Monopol.
In 1999, Niermann first contributed a short story (10 000 Jahre [10,000 years]) to the anthology “Mesopotamia” edited by Swiss writer Christian Kracht. His debut novel Der Effekt was published in 2001. It were mainly these two publications that established a perceived link with Germany’s 1990s “pop literature” movement.
Niermann successfully veered from this perception with his acclaimed 2003 book Minusvisionen [best translated as “Negative-only visions”; also a neologism in German], published by Suhrkamp. The book revived the literary form of the protocol (German “Protokoll”), drawing on motives of interview and oral history. It chronicles the visions, projects and (economic) failure of several young German entrepreneurs.
In 2006, Umbauland appeared, also at Suhrkamp. It presents ten ideas of Niermann — partly conceived with friends and colleagues — on how Germany could be and should be radically reformed. Suggestion include the construction of a large-scale pyramid as tourist attraction and grave site in Eastern Germany, nuclear armament, or a radical re-vamping of the German language (“Rededeutsch”).
Late February 2007 saw the publication of Metan [“Methane”, misspelled], the product of teaming up with Christian Kracht and climbing up Kilimanjaro. The book describes the mysterious power of methane gas. Another reviewer refers to the book as a parody of "alarmism" and suggested it should be taken as a joke: "But if this book is taken as a joke, it probably is not a bad one.” It has been translated into several languages, such as Latvian and Russian.
Scholarly voices have suggested to read particularly Metan but also Niermann’s other offerings as indication of a camp take on public and political issues.
As a result of two stays in Beijing, PR China, Niermann published another chronicle book, China ruft Dich [“China is calling you”] in early 2008. The book records the stories, experiences and perceptions of German and other non-Chinese expatriates who have decided to pursue life in rapidly-changing China of the 00 years. Niermann flanks these reports (or protocols) with Chinese views, for example by renowned artist Ai Weiwei.
Also in 2008, Niermann’s take on the miscellanea wave, entitled The Curious World of Drugs and co-authored with journalist Adriano Sack was published by Plume (US; UK publisher: Turnaround).
In 2004, Niermann together with artist Antje Majewski curated the exhibition Atomkrieg [“Nuclear War”] at the Kunsthaus Dresden.
2007 saw the Great Pyramid Monument project as outlined in Umbauland (see above) gain momentum.
In October 2008, Niermann had his first solo exhibition as an artist entitled JOIN THE U.S. ARMY at ZERN Gallery, Berlin.
Since 2008, Niermann functions as series editor of Solutions (original publications in English), published by Sternberg press and designed by Zak Kyes.In the series, Niermann himself together with Jens Thiel published Solution 9: The Great Pyramid with contributions by Rem Koolhaas, Ai Weiwei, Christian Kracht, David Woodard and others.
Since 2008, Niermann functions as part of The Choices, an ongoing series conceived by Zak Kyes and Ingo Niermann.
In early 2009, Umbauland in English as well as the Book of Scotlands by musician and writer Momus aka Nick Currie will follow in the series.
