Timm Rautert
Timm Rautert (born 1941) is regarded as one of the most influential German photographers of the post-war period. He has had a decisive influence on the development of contemporary photography, both through his own work and through his pioneering contributions to education.
Education and early career
Rautert was born in 1941 in Tuchel (West Prussia), but initially completed a vocational apprenticeship as a window dresser and painter. His artistic development in the medium of photography began between 1966 and 1971, when he studied at the renowned Folkwang School in Essen. There, he became a master student under Otto Steinert.
Artistic output and stylistic development
Rautert’s work is characterised by a constant shift between documentary, journalistic and conceptual approaches.
Image-analytical photography: from 1969 onwards, he developed this methodological research series. In doing so, he examined the very conditions of photography itself – how light, exposure and chemical processes shape the final image, and how reality is constructed by the camera in the first place.
Photojournalism (the ZEITmagazin era): In the 1970s and 1980s, he worked intensively as a freelance photojournalist. His collaboration with the author and reporter Michael Holzach for ZEITmagazin became legendary. Together, they created milestones in ‘visual storytelling’ by documenting marginalised social groups, milieus and social realities in an unvarnished yet deeply humanistic manner.
Changes in the world of work: From the early 1990s onwards, Rautert turned his back on traditional journalism. He devoted himself to long-term photographic projects documenting the rise of computer-controlled automation and robotics in industrial production (including in works such as *Gehäuse des Unsichtbaren*).
His professorship at the HGB Leipzig (1993–2008)
A central chapter in Rautert’s biography is his teaching career. In 1993, he took up a post at the Leipzig Academy of Visual Arts (HGB), where he held the Chair of Artistic Photography until 2008.
Rautert brought about a lasting modernisation of the curriculum at the HGB by bridging the gap between the classical East German tradition of documentation and Western, conceptual approaches. His class became a breeding ground for talent within the international contemporary art scene. Among his best-known students are renowned artists such as Tobias Zielony, Ricarda Roggan and Göran Gnaudschun. He documented his formative years and the theoretical discussions with his students in, amongst other works, the highly acclaimed publication *Retroactive Reality*.
The IKS Photo collection includes one of his famous photo portfolios, *Vor aller Augen* (2005), which he painstakingly produced with each of his graduating classes.
Documentary tribute
The complexity of his life’s work – from early experimental series such as *New York / Osaka* (1969–1971) through his famous portrait series to his later industrial studies – forms the basis for Ralph Goertz’s documentary film, released in 2021.
The film sheds light on precisely this analytical and inquisitive spirit that makes Timm Rautert a key figure in the history of German photography.
Watch it on Vimeo!
photo: Ralph Goertz © IKS-Medienarchiv 2018