Patzsch, toNeue Sachlichkeit(New Objectivity).
Sander was opposed to the use of darkroom tech-
niques to alter photographic images; he believed
instead in dealing with the visible world in a direct
and forthright manner.
When the Nazi party came into control of Ger-
many in 1933, the printing plates forAntlitz der
Zeit were confiscated, and he was forbidden to
publish—all without explanation. Most likely, San-
der’s view of German society as widely variegated,
exemplified by the many different types of people
he presented in his range of typical Germans, con-
trasted too dramatically with the image of a pure
race that the Party was trying to promulgate.
Through the 1930s, Sander’s work focused on
new themes that proved less provocative. He pub-
lished a series of five books calledDeutsche Lande,
Deutsche Menschen(German Lands, German Peo-
ple), that each focused on a different part of the
country and its local inhabitants. (The wordVolk
was used instead ofMenschenfor the last three
books in the series—a possible concession to Nazi
taste.) Sander tried to live a low-profile life under
the Nazis, but the arrest of his son (who would die
in prison) as a communist activist combined with
his own refusal to ostracize local Jews kept Sander
in constant trouble with the Party. The harassment
continued even when he moved to the small village
of Kuchhausen at the beginning of World War II.
Sander and his wife remained in Kuchhausen for
the duration of the war. Sadly, their new house was
too small to allow him to move many of his nega-
tives from the city. All of the material he had left
behind was destroyed—ironically, not by the
bombing of the city during the war, but by a fire
caused by post-war looters. For this reason, his
dream of completing the full version ofMenschen
des 20. Jarhundertswas never realized. In spite of
his age—he was in his late sixties by the end of the
war—he continued to work vigorously to meet the
new demand for his work for exhibitions during
the 1950s and early 1960s. Sander died of a stroke
at the age of 88 in Cologne.
Sander’s work has influenced generations of
photographers, including that of his contemporary,
Walker Evans; the Americans Robert Frank and
Diane Arbus, who emerged in the 1950s to put their
mark on portraiture; the influential German photo-
graphers and teachers Hilla and Bernd Becher, who
in turn influenced many of the major figures in
photography in the last decades of the twentieth
century; and many emerging figures of the late
twentieth century, including those practicing Con-
ceptual Photography, and portraitists such as the
Dutch photographer Rineke Dijkstra and Ameri-
can Catherine Opie. In 1992, Sander’s archive was
acquired by the SK Cultural Foundation, Cologne,
and it forms the core of this foundation’s photo-
graphic archive. The archive has published facsi-
mile editions of Sander’s classic books.
JohnStomberg
Seealso:Arbus, Diane; Becher, Berna and Hilla;
Conceptual Photography; Dijkstra, Rineke; Docu-
mentary Photography; Evans, Walker; Frank,
Robert; History of Photography: Interwar Years;
History of Photography: Twentieth-Century Pio-
neers; Modernism; Non-Silver Processes; Photo-
graphic ‘‘Truth’’; Photography in Germany and
Austria; Portraiture; Renger-Patzsch, Albert; Social
Representation; TypologyBiography
Born 17 November 1876, Herdorf, Germany. Studied paint-
ing at the Art Academy in Dresden, c. 1898. Director,
Photographic Studio Greif, Linz, Austria, 1901–1902;
Studio Sander and Stukenbern, Linz, Austria, 1902–
1904; August Sander Studio for Pictorial Arts of Pho-
tography and Painting, Linz, Austria, 1904–1909;
August Sander Studio, Lindenthal, Germany, 1910–
1946 (private studio in Kuchhausen beginning in 1939).
Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in
1960; Cultural Prize from the German Photographic
Society, 1960. Died on 20 April 1964, Cologne, Ger-
many.Individual Exhibitions
1906 Landhaus Pavilion; Linz, Austria
1927 Man of the Twentieth Century;Ko ˆ ln Kunstverein,
Cologne, Germany
1959 August Sander, Figures of His Time; German Photo-
graphic Society; Cologne, Germany
1976 August Sander: A retrospective in honor of the artist’s
100th birthday; Sander Gallery; Washington, D.C.
1994 August Sander: In der Photographie gibt es keine
ungekla ̈rten Schatten!; August Sander Archives/Stiftung
City-Treff Ko ̈ln; Cologne, GermanyGroup Exhibitions
1904 Paris Exposition; Palace of Fine Arts; Paris
1951 Photokina; Cologne, Germany
1955 The Family of Man; Museum of Modern Art; New
YorkSelected Works
Mother and Daughter, 1912
Young Farmers, c. 1914
Pastry Cook, c. 1928
The Painter Otto Dix and His Wife, 1928
Boxers, c. 1928
Unemployed Man, Cologne, 1928SANDER, AUGUST