Biography
Born in Apolda, Thuringia, Germany, 21 February 1890.
Attended university in Leipzig, Berlin, Basel, and
Munich. Doctoral degree in Art History, Munich,
- Art Historian, publisher, critic, curator, and
photographer. Published two art monographs (on
Anne Biermann and La ́szlo ́Moholy-Nagy), wrote four
books on art history (from seventeenth-century art to the
art of mid-twentieth century); authored numerous cata-
logues on photography of the 1920s. Curated important
photographic survey exhibitions including, in 1929, the
mesmericFilm und Foto. Wrote art criticism for the
journalsCiceroneandDas Kunstblatt. Appointed leader
of the German Section, International Association of Art
Critics, 1951. Created Society of the Friends of Modern
Art (Gesellschaft der Freunde Junger Kunst), 1954.
Taught Art History in Munich, from 1945. Died in Mu-
nich, Germany, 30 December 1965.
Group Exhibitions
1927 Nackt im Auto
1930 Das Lichtbild [The Photograph]; Internationale Aus-
stellung; Munich
1932 Internationale de la Photographie; Palais des Beaux-
Arts; Brussels
1966 Der Bild-und Bildungswert der Fotografie; Galerie
Further Reading
Bertonati, Emilio.Das experimentelle Foto in Deutschland
1918–1940. Munich: Galeria del Levante, 1978.
Coke, Van Deren, Ute Eskildsen, and Bernd Lohse.Avant-
Garde Photography in Germany 1919–1939. California:
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1980.
Fernandez, Horacio, ed.Fotografia Publica Photography in
Print. Spain: Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina
Sofia, 1999.
Roh, Franz. Nachexpressionismu—Magischer Realismus:
Probleme der neuesten Europaischen Malerei [After
Expressionism—Magic Realism: Problems in Recent
European Painting], 1925.
Roh, Franz, and Jan Tschichold.Foto–Auge/Oeil et Photo/
Photo Eye:76 Fotos der Zeit.[Photo-Eye]. Stuttgart:
Akademischer Verlag F. Wedekind, 1929.
Roh, Franz, Klinkhardt and Biermann. Moholy-Nagy, L.,
60 Fotos. Berlin: Fototek 1, 1930.
Roh, Franz, Klinkhardt and Biermann. Anne. 60 Fotos.
Berlin: Fototek 2, 1930.
Roh, Franz. ‘‘U ̈ber die freien Mo ̈glichkeiten der Fotogra-
fie.’’Leica Fotografie(January/February 1951).
Roh, Franz. ‘‘Subjektive Fotografien.’’Camera(1951).
Roh, Franz. Zu Solarisationsfotos von Eugen Funk. Geb-
rauchsgraphik, 1958.
Roh, Juliane.Retrospektive Fotografie: Franz Roh. Edition
Marzona, 1981.
———. ‘‘Der Wert der Fotographie.’’Hand und Maschine,
v1, n.11, (February 1930):.
———. ‘‘Internationale Fotoausstellung im Kunstgewerbe-
museum Breslau.’’ InSchlesische Monatshefte. Breslau,
1931.
———. ‘‘Formes Nues.’’ InEditions d’Art Graphique et
Photographie.Paris, 1935.MARTHA ROSLER
American
Martha Rosler is a photographer, writer, and video
and performance artist. She is an important figure
for feminist and conceptual photography. Her work
explores gender, class, territory, ownership, and pol-
itics, among many other controversial and highly
debated issues of the late twentieth century. As a
leading contemporary artist, Rosler has also gener-
ated an important body of photographic work.
Through this work, she has provoked considerable
dialogue regarding social interaction and the way in
which photography documents individuals, experi-
ences, and ideas.
Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1944, Rosler’s ear-
ly interest in art was as a painter. She took an under-
graduate degree from the Brooklyn College and went
on to the University of California, San Diego to
attend a graduate program in fine arts in 1975. The
graduate program included faculty members and cri-
tical thinkers Herbert Marcuse and Fredric Jameson,
as well as many internationally recognized university
lecturers. As a result, Rosler became more interested
in conceptual art production, focusing on a reconsi-
deration of conventional methods of representation,
display, and distribution.
But even before attending the University of Cali-
fornia, Rosler’s earliest photographic works showROSLER, MARTHA