Kurt Julius

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Kurt Julius (born January 28, 1909 in Hanover , † August 4, 1986 in Kirchheim near Munich ) was a German photographer. He is considered one of the most important post-war photographers in Hanover and a chronicler of the city's theater life from 1949 to the end of the 1970s.

biography

Kurt Julius was born in Hanover in 1909 as the son of the photographer Hugo Julius . He had two sisters, Ilse and Katja. His sister Ilse, who was two years older than him, also worked as a photographer, while his sister Katja, who was one year younger, had been married to the film director Rudolf Jugert since 1945 .

Kurt Julius married Anneliese Marie Köppen in 1945 and had two children with her: Jörg (born 1947) and Claudia (born 1949). In 1980 Kurt and Anneliese Julius moved from Hanover to Kirchheim near Munich. There he worked as a freelance photographer.

Julius belonged to the Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner (GDL) and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie e. V. (DGPh). He died on August 4, 1986 in Kirchheim.

In 1993 the Hanover Theater Museum acquired his photographic legacy.

education

Kurt Julius spent his school days in Hanover, where he attended the Bismarck School. In 1928 he began studying photography at the Bavarian State College for Photography in Munich , which he completed in 1930 with distinction. Until his master's examination in 1937, he worked in various photo studios in Germany and abroad.

Hanover

In 1938 Julius went into business for himself and took over the photo studio of his father Hugo Julius in Georgstrasse in Hanover, opposite the opera house. It fell victim to the air raids on Hanover in 1943 . Until 1953 Julius ran his studio in his private apartment on Ellernstrasse, then he relocated it again near the opera house on Rathenaustrasse in the city center.

He works primarily as a portrait, advertising and theater photographer. In 1949 Kurt Julius received his first commission as a theater photographer, namely for the production of Goethe's “Faust II” at the Lower Saxony State Theater in Hanover . From then on he documented the resurgence of the theater after the Second World War in the Lower Saxony state capital and accompanied the performances on the stages of the Lower Saxony State Theater in Hanover until 1979. His theater photographs, however, are not to be seen as pure documentation. Julius not only photographed the scene, but staged the photographs himself so that they reproduced the dramatic course of the play and highlighted the special features of the individual scenes.

Julius came into contact with the film industry through his brother-in-law Rudolf Jugert . For his film Untitled Film from 1947/48 he photographed the actors. His photo of the leading actress Hildegard Knef (1925–2002) was the cover picture of the first issue of the Illustrierte Stern on August 1, 1948. During his long career in the film industry, Julius photographed numerous prominent actors, which earned him the name “star photographer”. In 1950 Kurt Julius wrote an article for "Photo-Magazin" about this area of ​​his photographic activity.

The photographer had a close friendship with the Hanoverian painter Harald Schaub . Julius reproduced Schaub's works for exhibition catalogs and contemporary feature articles. In 1959 they both presented their works at a joint exhibition entitled Camera and Chalk .

In 1950 Julius received an invitation to the first "phokina" (from 1951: photokina ) in Cologne , the first photo and cinema exhibition after the war. From then on he was represented several times at this globally important photography fair. In 1950 and 1951 his works were awarded the silver plaque. In the same year, Julius was appointed to the Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner (GDL) in 1950, and in 1951 he was appointed to the newly founded Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie e. V. (DGPh).

Kirchheim

In 1980 Kurt and Anneliese Julius moved to Kirchheim near Munich. There he devoted himself only to free work, especially portrait studies. Among other things, a series of portraits by well-known photographers was created, for example by Peter Keetman (1981).

Kurt Julius died on August 4, 1986.

Exhibitions (selection)

  • 1958 Hamburg, State Image Office (solo exhibition)
  • 1959 Hanover, house Kurt-Schumacher-Straße 38/40, corner of Goseriede: camera and chalk , together with the painter Harald Schaub
  • 1967 Hanover, craft form: drama in the photo (solo exhibition)
  • 1969 Hanover, Städtische Galerie KUBUS : 10 photographers in Hanover (group exhibition: Joachim Giesel ; Wilhelm Hauschild ; Udo Heuer ; Kurt Julius; Heinz Koberg ; Werner Koblizek ; Reinhold Lessmann ; Günter R Reitz ; Heinrich Riebesehl ; Umbo )
  • 1970 Hanover, Marktgalerie: Three Photographers and a Girl (group exhibition: Heinz Riebesehl, Kurt Julius, Joachim Giesel)
  • 1977 Hanover, Galerie am Ballhof : 25 years of theater photography (solo exhibition)
  • 1977 Hanover, craft: photography in Hanover (group exhibition)
  • 1979 Hanover, Gallery Spectrum: Kurt Julius - Photographien 1945-1978 (solo exhibition) (with catalog)
  • 1983 Leinfelden-Echterdingen, Städtische Galerie Filderhalle: GDL: Julius, Kurt / Moegle, Willi / Hildenhagen, Günter. Exhibition of three photographers from the Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner GDL (with catalog)
  • 2009 Hanover, Theater Museum: The theater photographer Kurt Julius (1909-1986) (special exhibition on the 100th birthday)

Publications (selection)

  • Harald Schaub: The face. Catalog of the exhibition in the Kurt Julius photo studio in March 1956, Hanover: Gebrüder Jänecke 1956 (repro photos: Kurt Julius)
  • Kurt Julius, play at the Landestheater Hannover. Photographed by Kurt Julius, published by the Society of Friends of the Hannoversche Schauspielhaus eV, Hanover: Madsack 1968
  • Franz Reichert, The theater in Hanover under Franz Reichert. 1965-1973. Photographed by Kurt Julius, Hanover 1973
  • Tassilo Knauf, Lüne Monastery. Photographs by Ilse and Kurt Julius, Hanover 1974
  • Kurt Julius, Photographs 1945–1978 (exhibition catalog), Hanover: Galerie Spectrum 1979
  • GDL exhibition 1983: Kurt Julius, Willi Moegle, Günter Hildenhagen, Leinfelden-Echterdingen: GDL Gesellschaft Deutscher Lichtbildner e. V., 1983
  • Exhib. Catalog Harald Schaub. Painter and writer - pictures from 4 decades, kunstverein wunstorf, 1984. With a foreword by Kurt Ewert. (Photos: Kurt Julius)

Awards (selection)

literature

  • Reinhold Mißelbeck : Kurt Julius , in: Deutsche Lichtbildner: Wegbereiter der Contemporary Photography , DuMont, Cologne 1987, p. 133

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Claudia Polak: Kurt Julius Vita. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on March 1, 2014 ; accessed on March 7, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Munich Photo School 1900-2000. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on February 25, 2014 ; accessed on March 7, 2019 . 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.arthistoricum.net
  3. ↑ Cf. Carsten Niemann, Der Theaterfotograf Kurt Julius (1909-1986) , special exhibition January 15 to March 22, 2009 on the occasion of the 100th birthday, accessed on February 19, 2014.
  4. ↑ See Mißelbeck, p. 9.
  5. ↑ See Mißelbeck, p. 133.
  6. ↑ See Mißelbeck, p. 11.
  7. ↑ Kurt Julius: One calls me a star photographer, in: Photo - Magazin, Munich, January 1950 (series: Photographische Berufe), p. 38f.
  8. ↑ See above: Answer to controversial issues. On the exhibition “Camera and Chalk” in Hanover, in: photo / presse - specialist journal for all photography for craft, trade and industry, p. 3.
  9. ↑ See Mißelbeck, p. 133.
personal data
SURNAME Julius, Kurt
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German photographer
DATE OF BIRTH January 28, 1909
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH 4th August 1986
Place of death Kirchheim near Munich