Albert Renger-Patzsch - Strumpffabrik Schocken, Chemnitz - image-1

Lot 23 D

Albert Renger-Patzsch - Strumpffabrik Schocken, Chemnitz

Auction 1068 - overview Cologne
03.06.2016, 14:00 - Photography
Estimate: 6.000 € - 8.000 €
Result: 31.000 € (incl. premium)

Albert Renger-Patzsch

Strumpffabrik Schocken, Chemnitz
1925

Vintage gelatin silver print. 22.8 x 16.8 cm (23.3 x 17.3 cm). Photographer's and copyright stamps as well as inscribed ‚Baumwollpoppse (?) Strumpffabrik Schocken, Chemnitz‘ in pencil on the verso.

Although depicting an entirely different motif, this depiction of yarn reels, shot in the Schocken stockings factory in Chemnitz in 1925, displays the same compositional principles used to great effect in “Natterkopf”. The motif is depicted from a cropped perspective in which the contours of the stacked reels merge to form a purely graphical, rhythmic pattern. The rigid arrangement of the motif seems to reference the industrial, serial production of the yarn. “In industrial commissions such as this one, Renger-Patzsch illustrates […] the functionality of industrial production as an autonomous size” (Thomas Janzen, in: Das „Wesen der Dinge“ fotografieren, in: Ann und Jürgen Wilde/Thomas Weski, Albert Renger-Patzsch. Meisterwerke, Munich et al. 1997, p. 17). The photographer's works mirror the technological enthusiasm and optimistic view of progress typical of the 1920s.

Provenance

From the photographer to the father of the present owner

Literature

Klaus Honnef (ed.), Industrielandschaft, Industriearchitektur, Industrieprodukt. Fotografien 1925 – 1960 von Albert Renger-Patzsch, exhib.cat. Rheinisches Landesmuseum Bonn, Cologne et al. 1977, ill. p. 103; Ann and Jürgen Wilde/Beate Reese, Albert Renger-Patzsch zum 100. Geburtstag. Frühe Fotografien, exhib.cat. Städtische Galerie Würzburg, Würzburg 1997, ill. p. 40; Albert Renger-Patzsch zum 111. Geburtstag. Pflanzen Dinge Ruhrgebiet, exhib.cat. Stadt Paderborn/Städtische Galerie Am Abdinghof, Bonn 2008, ill. p. 86; Bernd Stiegler/Ann and Jürgen Wilde (ed.), Albert Renger-Patzsch. Die Freude am Gegenstand. Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Photographie, Munich 2010, ill. p. 244