Albert Renger-Patzsch papers, 1890-1980 (bulk 1924-1966), bulk 1924-1966

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Summary

Creators:

Wunder, Franz, Wulf, Friedrich, 1908-, Wolf, Gustav, Werkstätten J. Dickerhoff, Wapnewski, Peter, Walker, Audrey, Wahl, Victor, Wackernagel, Martin, 1881-1962, Völckers, Otto, 1888-, Trump, Georg, 1896-, Toller, Ernst, 1893-1939, Sydslesvigs danske kunstforening, Thorn Prikker, Johan, 1868-1932, Sternberger, Dolf, 1907-1989, Strelow, Liselotte, 1908-1981, Steichen, Edward, 1879-1973, Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, Steffann, Emil, 1899-1968, Schütz-Wolff, Johanna, 1896-, Schöppe, Wilhelm, Schwarz, Heinrich, 1894-1974, Schupp, F. (Fritz), 1896-1974, Schott, Erich, Schneider-Esleben, Paul, Schumacher, Fritz, 1869-1947, Schmoll gen. Eisenwerth, J. A. (Josef Adolf), 1915-2010, Schlensker, Ernst, Schneider, P. F., Russell, Peter, Schaeffer-Heyrothsberge, Paul, Scheven, Ilsemarie von, Riedel & Co. (Bielefeld, Germany), Riewerts, Theodor, 1907-1944, Roh, Franz, 1890-1965, Rothert, Liebetraut, Redslob, Edwin, 1884-1973, Renger-Patzsch, Albert, 1897-1966, Richter, Max, 1900-, Pieper, Paul, 1912-2000, Presswerk AG, Pécsi, Jósef, Gross, Else R., Gosebruch, Ernst, Gropius, Walter, 1883-1969, Greischel, Walther, Freckmann, Karl, 1890-, Fuhrmann, Ernst, 1886-1956, Goldberg, Rube, 1883-1970, Hertwig, Hugo, Goerttler, Kurt, 1898-, Heise, Carl Georg, 1890-1979, Gurlitt, Hildebrand, Gruber, L. Fritz, Jancke, Rudolf, Jenaer Glaswerk Schott & Gen, Hans Peters Verlag, Jacobi, Lotte, 1896-1990, Holzmeister, Gunda, Haber, Wolfgang, Krauss, Friedrich Emil, Klipstein, Editha, 1880-1953, Gundermann, Leo, Kerff, Gerhard, 1908-, Jünger, Ernst, 1895-1998, Heyer, Gustav Richard, 1890-1967, Arapoff, Cyril, C.H. Boehringer Sohn, Helfferich, Daan, Henze, Helene, Barth, Emil, 1900-1958, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie, Johannsen, Johann, Deutscher Spinnereimaschinenbau Ingolstadt, Jaenisch, Hans, 1907-1989, Brandt, Bill, Deutsche Spiegelglas A.G, Gernsheim, Helmut, 1913-1995, Fürst, Viktor, 1919-, Hoppé, E. O. (Emil Otto), 1878-1972, Erfurth, Hugo, 1874-1948, Huch, Ricarda, 1864-1947, Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner, Kotthoff, August, Kempe, Fritz, Klingender, F. D. (Francis Donald), Lichnowsky, Mechtilde, 1879-1958, Lissitzky, El, 1890-1941, Kreutter, Wolfgang, Kreusch, Felix, Kösters, Bernd, Krupp Stahl AG. Werk (Rheinhausen, Duisburg, Germany), Mattaei, Leni, Meyer, Peter, 1894-1984, Mann, Thomas, 1875-1955, Marcks, Gerhard, Photo ciné club du Val de Bièvre, Photographische Gesellschaft in Wien, Molzahn, Johannes, 1892-1965, Museum für Photographie (Dresden, Germany), Obpacher Kunstverlag, Bartning, Otto, 1883-1959, Boje, Walter, Behrens, Peter, 1868-1940, Bourdeau, Robert, 1931-, Botzenhart, Prof. Dr., Deutsche Buch-Gemeinschaft, Deutsche Bibliothek (Frankfurt am Main, Germany) Sammlung Buchkunst, Deutscher Kunstverlag, Deutscher Werkbund Berlin, Dr. Karl Thomae GmbH, Ehmke, Rainer, Essener Steinkohlenbergwerke, Fagus-Werk (Alfeld, Lower Saxony, Germany), Focal Press, Wigman, Mary, 1886-1973, Woytinsky, W. S. (Wladimir S.), 1885-1960, Zglinicki, Friedrich Pruss von, 1895-1986, Smith, Käthe, Vogelsang, Marianne, Tümpel, Wolfgang, 1903-1978, Weinert, August, Virl, Hermann, 1903-1958, Hartlaub, Gustav Friedrich, 1884-1963, Schwarz, Rudolf, 1897-1961, Schwippert, Hans, 1899-1973, Steinert, Otto, 1915-1978, Steffen, Dieter, Museum Folkwang Essen, Moholy-Nagy, László, 1895-1946, Padberg, Magdalena, Oliveira, Jaap d', Mahlau, Alfred, 1894-1967, Kozma, Lajos, 1884-1950, Mardersteig, Giovanni, 1892-1977, and Masclet, Daniel, 1892-1969

Abstract:

German photographer associated with the art movement Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity). The archive documents Renger-Patzsch's professional life, especially his work on book projects and commissions for industrial firms. It also includes technical details of his photographic workshop, and provides insight into his artistic views on photography as an independent art form, and on the aesthetic trends in photography in economically prosperous postwar Germany.

Extent:

12 Linear Feet (23 boxes, 1 flat file folder)

Language:

German .

Preferred citation:

Albert Renger-Patzsch papers, 1924-1966, Accession no. 861187, Getty Research Institute, Research Library.

http://hdl.handle.net/10020/cifa861187

Background

Scope and content:

The archive documents Albert Renger-Patzsch's professional life and provides detailed information about his business-related activities, especially his work on book projects and private commissions for industrial firms. It also allows insight into his artistic views on photography and the technical details of his photographic workshop. A small portion of the archive consists of personal documents and family correspondence. Almost all items are in German; most are typescripts, or carbon copies of typescripts, especially letters by Albert Renger-Patzsch. Relatively few are in old German handwriting.

The main portion of the archive consists of post-war correspondence between Renger-Patzsch and numerous institutions, industrial firms, and individual correspondents. A relatively small part of the correspondence dates from the time before the war. Set apart is the predominantly business-related correspondence of Renger-Patzsch's widow Agnes and his son Ernst, and the personal correspondence of Albert Renger-Patzsch, mainly letters from his mother Frieda and other relatives. Two separate groups of correspondence are organized by topic.

Another significant portion of the archive presents ca. 30 drafts of mostly unpublished lectures and articles about photography by Albert Renger-Patzsch.

A large number of ephemeral publications, newspaper clippings and offprints related to Albert Renger-Patzsch provides information about the scope and reception of his photographic work before and after the war, his book projects, exhibitions, and other professional activities. Also included are a small number of personal documents related to Albert Renger-Patzsch and his family, a few portrait photographs taken by his daughter Sabine, poems by unknown authors, and business-related bills and receipts.

The archive includes several drafts of book texts by other authors: both texts about Renger-Patzsch and texts written to accompany Renger-Patzsch's books of photographs. Also in the archive are drafts of texts unrelated to Albert Renger-Patzsch, including 9 unpublished texts by the German ecologist Hugo Hertwig.

Biographical / historical:

The German photographer Albert Renger-Patzsch (1897 -1966) was born in Würzburg, Bavaria, and died in Wamel near Soest, Westphalia. Son of amateur photographer Robert Renger-Patzsch, he learned the techniques of photography early. Following primary education in Sondeshausen in Thuringia, Albert Renger-Patzsch attended the renowned Kreuzgymnasium in Dresden. After service in the German Army between 1916 and 1918, he studied chemistry at the Technische Hochschule in Dresden from 1919 to 1921.

His professional career as a photographer began in the early 1920s at the Folkwang Verlag in Essen, and at the Folkwang and Auriga Archiv in Hagen, where he was the head of photographic services. In 1923, he served as head of a photographic service agency in Berlin. In that same year, he married Agnes von Braunschweig and moved briefly to Kronstadt (Brasov) in Romania. His daughter Sabine was born in 1924, his son Ernst Normann in 1926. In 1924 Renger-Patzsch returned briefly to Darmstadt to work at the Auriga Verlag, the successor of the Folkwang Verlag. In 1925 he left the Auriga Verlag to become a freelance photographer, joined the Deutscher Werkbund, and moved with his family to Bad Harzburg, near Braunschweig. His first exhibition was mounted in his studio.

Between 1924 and 1937, Renger-Patzsch collaborated on several book projects, including the series Die Welt der Pflanze, conceived by Ernst Fuhrmann (volumes Crassula and Orchideen, both 1924). Other project partners included Rudolf Schwarz ( Wegweisung der Technik, 1928), Carl Georg Heise ( Lübeck, 1928), and the Auriga Verlag ( Das Chorgestühl von Kappenberg, 1925). His influential book Die Welt ist schön appeared in 1928, published by Kurt Wolff Verlag in Munich; the Einhorn Verlag edition followed in the same year. In 1927, Carl Georg Heise organized an exhibition of Renger-Patzsch's photographic work at the Behnhaus in Lübeck. In 1928, Renger-Patzsch participated in the exhibition Kunst und Technik at the Museum Folkwang in Essen; he also held two individual exhibitions, one at the Kunstgewerbemuseum in Zurich and another at the Grafisches Kabinett in Munich.

In 1929 Renger-Patzsch moved with his family to Essen, where he had a studio and office at the Museum Folkwang. During this time he worked intensively with the industrial architect Fritz Schupp, and made architectural photographs for the architect and director of the Kunstgewerbeschule Aachen, Rudolf Schwarz. The first retrospective exhibition of his work took place in 1931 at the Museum Folkwang in Essen. His industrial photographs, published in the book Eisen und Stahl (1931), won a silver medal at the Milan Triennale in 1933. During 1933, Renger-Patzsch lectured at the Folkwang School in Essen, and took over the chair of photography from Max Burchartz.

Between 1938 and 1940, Renger-Patzsch received his first commissions from the chemical concern C. H. Boehringer Sohn in Ingelheim: Hospitalbauten in Europa aus zehn Jahrhunderten (first issued in 1967), a book about hospital buildings in Europe with text by Dankwart Leistikow, and Historische Apotheken Deutschlands (year of issue unknown), a book about historical pharmacies. During the years 1941 to 1944, Renger-Patzsch worked on the book projects Paderborn (first issued in 1949) and Land am Oberrhein (appearing in 1944 in small edition). In 1943, he was commissioned by the Todt Organization to take pictures of the Western defences of the German forces in Normandy and Brittany. A large part of Renger-Patzsch's archive in the Museum Folkwang was destroyed during an air raid on Essen in 1944. Shortly afterwards Renger-Patzsch moved with his family to Wamel on the Möhnesee, near Soest, where he lived for the remainder of his life.

Beständinge Welt, a small volume with landscape photographs with text by Helene Henze, initiated his post-war work in 1947. The year 1949 marked the start of long-term commission work for the firm Schubert & Salzer, a spinning machine manufacturer in Ingolstadt, as well as the continuation of work begun in 1932 for the glass manufacturer Jenaer Glaswerk Schott & Gen., and the firm C. H. Boehringer Sohn in Ingelheim. He also undertook commissions for the architects Fritz Schupp in Essen and Hans Schwippert in Düsseldorf. The Siepman Werke in Belecke commissioned Renger-Patzsch to produce two publications: Bilder aus der Landschaft zwischen Ruhr und Möhne (1957) and Bauten zwischen Ruhr und Möhne (1959). During the 1950s and 1960s Renger-Patzsch collaborated with the publisher Mocker & Jahn in Soest on the book projects Schloss Cappenberg (1953) and Soest (1963); he received commissions from numerous industrial companies in Germany. He also traveled throughout Europe, with several trips to Italy for the book project Hohenstaufenburgen in Süditalien (1961). This book, with text by Hanno Hahn, was commissioned by the firm C. H. Boehringer Sohn, which also commissioned the books Bäume (1962) and Gestein (1966), both with text by Ernst Jünger. A professional relationship developed between Renger-Patzsch and the German dendrologist Wolfgang Haber, who accompanied Renger-Patzsch on his trips to Italy and wrote texts for Im Wald (1965) and Bäume.

During the postwar years Renger-Patsch lectured on photography throughout Germany. His photographic work was recognized and awarded. In 1957, the Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner honored Renger-Patzsch with the David Octavius Hill Medal. In 1960, he received the prestigious culture prize of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie. In 1961, he received a gold medal from the Photographische Gesellschaft Wien for his life's work. In 1963, the television station Westdeutscher Rundfunk in Cologne broadcast the documentary Portrait of the Photographer Albert Renger-Patzsch. In 1965, the Minister of Culture awarded to Renger-Patzsch the North Rhine-Westphalia state prize for artistic achievement. Also in 1965, the German photographer Lotte Jacobi showed Renger-Patzsch's photographs in her gallery in Deering, New Hampshire, and the Art Institute of Chicago included his works in its annual photography exhibition.

Albert Renger-Patzsch died on September 27, 1966 in Wamel. In December of that year, a memorial exhibition was mounted in the Ruhrland- und Heimatmuseum in Essen. In 1970 and 1971, commemorative exhibitions were held in Bremen and Hamburg.

Acquisition information:

Acquired by the repository in 1986.

Processing information:

Isabella Zuralski processed the collection and wrote the finding aid.

Arrangement:

The papers are organized in 9 series: Series I. Correspondence, 1924-1966; Series II. Family and personal correspondence, 1924-1977; Series III. Correspondence by topic,1952-1967; Series IV. Writings by Albert Renger-Patzsch, 1954-1958,undated; Series V. Ephemera, 1927-1980; Series VI. Personal papers, 1890-1974; Series VII. Bills and receipts, 1930, 1962-1967; Series VIII. Manuscripts related to Albert Renger-Patzsch, 1927-1967, undated; Series IX. Texts unrelated to Albert Renger-Patzsch, 1922-1928, undated. Unidentified items are filed at the end of each series. Oversize items from various series are filed in Box 24*.

Physical location:

Request access to the physical materials described in this inventory through the catalog record for this collection. Click here for the access policy.

Rules or conventions:

archives, personal papers, and manuscripts

Indexed terms

Subjects:: Photographs, Original
Photographic prints
Letters (correspondence)
Lectures
Names:: Verlag Herder
Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner
Jenaer Glaswerk Schott & Gen
Museum Folkwang Essen
C.H. Boehringer Sohn
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie
Deutsche Spiegelglas A.G
Deutscher Spinnereimaschinenbau Ingolstadt
Zglinicki, Friedrich Pruss von, 1895-1986
Woytinsky, W. S. (Wladimir S.), 1885-1960
Wigman, Mary, 1886-1973
Weinert, August
Walther, Pan, 1921-
Vogelsang, Marianne
Virl, Hermann, 1903-1958
Tümpel, Wolfgang, 1903-1978
Treskow, Elisabeth, 1898-
Steinert, Otto, 1915-1978
Stenger, Erich, 1878-1957
Steffen, Dieter
Smith, Ronald Gregor
Smith, K. Gregor
Schwippert, Hans, 1899-1973
Schwarz, Rudolf, 1897-1961
Schoy, Frida
Schneider, Karl, 1892-1945
Sander, August
Renger-Patzsch, Albert, 1897-1966
Portman, Adolf
Greischel, Walther
Gosebruch, Ernst
Gernsheim, Helmut, 1913-1995
Heise, Carl Georg, 1890-1979
Hallensleben, Ruth
Gurlitt, Hildebrand
Gruber, L. Fritz
Hill, David Octavius, 1802-1870
Holzmeister, Gunda
Hesse, Ninon
Hertwig, Hugo
Hesse, Hermann, 1877-1962
Jancke, Rudolf
Jacobi, Lotte, 1896-1990
Klipstein, Editha, 1880-1953
Krauss, Friedrich Emil
Kozma, Lajos, 1884-1950
Jünger, Ernst, 1895-1998
Kerff, Gerhard, 1908-
Kükelhaus, Hugo
Mahlau, Alfred, 1894-1967
Moegle, Willi
Moholy-Nagy, László, 1895-1946
Mardersteig, Giovanni, 1892-1977
Masclet, Daniel, 1892-1969
Oliveira, Jaap d'
Padberg, Magdalena
Arapoff, Cyril
Barth, Emil, 1900-1958
Brandt, Bill
Erfurth, Hugo, 1874-1948
Fohn, Emanuel, 1881-1966
Freckmann, Karl, 1890-
Friedmann, Hermann, 1873-1957
Fuhrmann, Ernst, 1886-1956
Fürst, Viktor, 1919-

Access and use

Restrictions:: Open for use by qualified researchers.
Terms of access:: Contact Library Rights and Reproductions.