Walter Ballhauser

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Walter Ballhauser (born April 3, 1911 in Hameln , † July 8, 1991 in Plauen ) was a German photographer .

Walter Ballhauser was a photographer who, as a politically active person, mainly worked as a social documentary . He is assigned to the sub-area “ worker photography ”, even if he did not belong to the organization of worker photographers.

biography

Street sign in Hannover-Linden

Walter Ballshaus was born in Hameln as the youngest child of the shoemaker Karl Ball Hauser and the leather stepper Anna (née Helbig). He grew up in the poorest of circumstances. In the first eight years after starting school, he changed school eight times and changed residence ten times.

After his parents divorced, Walter moved with his mother to Hanover in 1919, where he worked as a newspaper delivery man and continued to attend elementary school until 1925. In the same year he began his training as a laboratory assistant at Hanomag in Hanover-Linden and was subsequently unemployed in 1928.

In 1925 Ballhauser worked for the social democratic youth organization “Die Falken” and was a member of the SPD from 1929 to 1931 , but in 1931, together with Otto Brenner , founded the Hanover branch of the German Socialist Workers' Party (SAP).

Around this time Ballhauser began taking photos in his social environment alongside his job and political activities. In 1933 he was imprisoned for a short time for political reasons. From 1934 to 1941 he took evening courses parallel to his work at Hanomag as a chemical technician and after 1941 he moved to Plauen, where he worked as the head of the Vomag laboratory . Ballhauser was arrested again in 1944 and was freed from the Zwickau penitentiary at Osterstein Castle on April 17, 1945 by American soldiers of the 89th Infantry Division . Ballhauser was then mayor of Straßberg until 1947 and founded a local group of the KPD there . From 1954 on he lived and worked in Plauen (technical director of the Plamag foundry). Ballhaus retired in 1971.

plant

Photographs

Walter Ballhauses photographs did not become public knowledge until the 1970s . Up until then, Ball House had consistently photographed for decades without his work being published or exhibited. Ballhauses photographs subsequently received considerable recognition because he succeeded in depicting the living situation of people on the fringes of society on a high artistic level. His main work, which was created between 1930 and 1933, documents the social situation of the lumpen proletariat of the time , the situation of the unemployed, disabled people, beggars but also the life of proletarian city children and old people. He also photographed a. a. Workers' settlements, documented the fears of the existence of small traders and recorded impressions from the hawks ' holiday camps and activities of the workers' sports movement. In addition, he also got impressions of contemporary leisure behavior. At the same time, he was a chronicler of his own political activities in the SAP, but also of the growing National Socialist movement. During this time Walter BallHAUS often took photos with a “hidden camera”, a Leica .

After the Second World War , Ball Hauser found connection to his photographic practice and experience. Now (as early as 1947) he photographed the reconstruction of Vomag and the work in this steel industry plant. Again the camera accompanied him in work and leisure.

After his work became public, the first publications came in 1981. In 1982 the Federal Congress of Workers Photographers ( Federal Republic of Germany ) accepted him as an honorary member. In 1988 he became an honorary member of the Association of Visual Artists in the GDR .

Fonts (incomplete)

  • Walter Ballhauser: Between Weimar and Hitler. Social documentary photography 1930–1933. Schirmer-Mosel, Munich 1981, ISBN 3-921375-86-X .
  • Walter Ballhauser, Johannes R. Becher: Superfluous people. Photographs and poems from the time of the great crisis. 1st edition. Reclam, Leipzig 1981.
  • Walter Ballhauser, Fritz Rudolf Fries: Light and shadow of the thirties. Photo documents from everyday life. Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-423-10501-1 . (Series dtv witnesses and testimonials. Dtv vol. 10501) (also as: Walter Ballhause: Between Weimar and Hitler. Schirmer / Mosel, Munich 1981, ISBN 3-921375-86-X )
  • Günter Dornfeld (head), Walter Ballhause (Ill.): Monuments in the Plauen district. edit by a working group of the district monument active Plauen. Council of the District, Culture Dept., Plauen 1982.
  • Rudolf Lerchenmüller, Walter Ballhause: 750 years of the municipality of Kürbitz 1225 - 1975. A local document about the history of the people and the development of their small village in beautiful surroundings near the top town of Plauen. Pumpkin village club, 1975.
  • Walter Ballhauser, Hans-Peter Wiechers: Hard times. People in Hanover 1930-1933. zu Klampen, Springe 2016, ISBN 978-3-86674-538-4 .

Exhibitions and lectures

  • 1971/72: Ballhaus made around 1,000 photo prints available for the exhibition Resistance in Lower Saxony .
  • From 1977 Ballhaus participated in exhibitions in both German states.
  • From 1981 individual exhibitions by Ballhaus would also be held abroad.
  • From 1982 Ballhauser gave slide-tone lectures in the GDR, the Federal Republic and the USA.

Honors

Movie

literature

Web links

Commons : Walter Ballhause  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Hugo Thielen: Ballhausen, Walter. In: Hannoversches Biographisches Lexikon , p. 37f.
  2. ↑ Birgit Wolf: Walter Ballhause (1911–1991). on the (online) magazine: Photographers and agencies in the image archive of the German Historical Museum. 11th year; Issue 26, Berlin, autumn 2001.
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Kai-Britt Albrecht: Walter Ballhausen. Tabular curriculum vitae in the LeMO ( DHM and HdG )
  4. ^ A b Hugo Thielen: Ballhaus, Walter. In: Stadtlexikon Hannover.
  5. ↑ Photo of the street sign
personal data
SURNAME Ballhaus, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German photographer
DATE OF BIRTH April 3, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamelin
DATE OF DEATH July 8, 1991
Place of death Plauen