Herbert List

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Herbert List (born October 7, 1903 in Hamburg , † April 4, 1975 in Munich ) was a German photographer . He is considered a "modern classic" and especially for his was surreal -looking B & W Photography known.

Life

Born in Hamburg in 1903, List attended the learned school of the Johanneum (grammar school) in Hamburg from 1912 to 1920 . From 1921 to 1923 he studied literary history in Heidelberg and in 1924 joined his father's coffee import company List & Heineken in Hamburg as an apprentice . As a coffee merchant, he traveled to Brazil , Guatemala , Costa Rica , San Salvador and the USA ( San Francisco ) from 1925 to 1928 and in 1929 became an authorized signatory in his father's company.

Encouraged by Andreas Feininger and under the influence of artists such as Giorgio de Chirico , Magritte and Man Ray , he began taking seriously himself in 1930. After his father's death in 1931, List had to take over the management, but photography interested him much more than business. In 1935 he handed the company over to his younger brother and emigrated to Paris to avoid arrest by the Gestapo (as a “quarter Jew” and critic of the Nazi system). In Paris, in 1937, his first exhibition took place at the Galerie du Chasseur d'Images . During a stay in London in 1937 List made his first attempts at studio photography and worked for the magazines Verve , Vogue , Harper's Bazaar and Life , among others .

He met George Hoyningen-Huene , with whom he went on a trip to Greece and Italy . The Greece photographs from the years 1937 to 1941 were incorporated into the illustrated book Licht über Hellas .

The German invasion of Greece forced List to return to Germany in 1941. He settled in Munich , but had little opportunity to publish there. From 1944 to 1945 he was a soldier in Norway and returned to Munich at the end of the war. Significant photographs of the city lying in ruins were taken.

List made his first post-war trip to Paris in 1948. He became the art editor of Heute , a magazine published by the occupying powers in Germany. In the following years (until 1962) he toured Italy, Greece, Spain , France , Mexico and the Caribbean and published photos and photo essays in Today , Du, Epoca, Look, Harper's Bazaar, Flair, Picture Post, Life etc. In addition he published several illustrated books. During this time he was associated with the Magnum agency , but only accepted a few orders. In 1963 he published his last book Bildwerke aus Nigeria .

In 1964 List was awarded the David Octavius ​​Hill Medal by the Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner . He had numerous exhibitions in London, Zurich , Munich, Düsseldorf , Milan and New York .

Since the mid-1960s he traveled several times to Italy, France and Mexico and built up his collection of Italian hand drawings from the 17th and 18th centuries, but gave up photography.

In 1975 Herbert List died in Munich. The administrator of Herbert List's photographic estate was Max Scheler .

Herbert List was given a literary monument by the figure of "Joachim" in Stephen Spender's novel "Der Tempel (The Temple)".

plant

In his photos, the motifs seem reduced to simple, archaic elements. List had a great influence on modern photography with his way of putting things into light. List was concerned with “grasping the magic of the appearance in the picture” , with a “ visionary strength” and less with technical perfection and he claimed: “The object is not objective. Otherwise it would be useless as an artistic medium ” .

Awards

Exhibitions (selection)

Publications

  • Light over Hellas (photos from Greece between 1937–1941) , Munich 1953
  • Rome , Munich 1955
  • Caribia , Hamburg 1958
  • Napoli , Gütersloh 1962
  • Pictorial works from Nigeria , Munich 1963
  • Martin Mayer , Munich 1972
  • Photographs 1930–1970 , Munich 1976
  • Portraits , Hamburg 1977
  • Young Men , Thames & Hudson, London 1988 (introduction by Stephen Spender ) ISBN 0-500-54147-7
  • Light over Hamborn. The magnum photographer Herbert List and the August Thyssen hut under reconstruction , publisher: LWL-Industriemuseum , Hattingen 2014, ISBN 978-3-8375-1148-2 .

Anthologies

  • One hundred years of the global economy as reflected in a company , Ernst Samhaber, Otto A. Friedrich, Freiburg 1956 (Phoenix Werke Hamburg; 29sw 7f photos)
  • US Camera Year-Book , New York 1957
  • DU , Zurich 1973
  • Portraits , Hoffmann & Campe, Hamburg 1977
  • Photographs 1930-1970 , Thames and Hudson, London and Rizzoli, New York 1980
  • Photographs 1930-1970 ; Reissued in 1980 by Max Scheler under the title: Fotografie Metafisica
  • Herbert List. I grandi fotografi . Milano 1982, German Munich 1983
  • Herbert List, Memento 1945. Munich ruins . Munich Photo Museum. Schirmer / Mosel, Munich 1995 ISBN 3-88814-763-8
  • Max Scheler and Matthias Harder (eds.). Herbert List. The monograph . With a foreword by Bruce Weber and texts by Herbert List u. a. Schirmer / Mosel, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-88814-533-3

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original dated September 3, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mare.de
  2. ↑ see chronology in: Max Scheler and Matthias Harder (eds.). Herbert List. The monograph . Schirmer / Mosel, Munich 2000 page 302 ff.
personal data
SURNAME List, Herbert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German photographer
DATE OF BIRTH October 7, 1903
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH April 4th 1975
Place of death Munich