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Hilde Lotz-Bauer
Work

Hilde Lotz Bauer, photographer

Commissioned work 1930s-1942

Postcards for museums
Freelance work for a German picture magazine with Helga Fietz
Commissions from art historians at the Biblioteca Hertziana and the Kunsthistorisches Institut Florence (KHI)
Commissions from Leo Bruhns and KHI director Friedrich Kriegbaum’s book projects: Florentine sculpture, bridges, courtyards, gardens, palaces, city gates, walls and urbanism

Cameras

Florentine collection: predominantly taken with a 13 x 18 cm wooden camera; some with a 9 x 12 cm Linhof, using glass plates and a variety of lenses. Filters and wide-angle lenses were avoided. Kodak and Perutz plates were used as well as Kodak panchromatic glass plates. She did all the developing and printing.

Hilde Lotz-Bauer with camera

Linhof 9x12
A Linhof 9x12 from the 1930s: You can see the sliding mechanism that tilts
the lens to ensure that walls are parallel unlike ordinary cameras that produce
buildings that appear to be leaning over!

She also worked with handheld Leicas, mostly for her personal work. Regine Schallert of the Biblioteca Hertziana has discovered some rare photographs taken by Hilde with a Leica for the art historian W.R. Valentiner. The Leica was useful for close up work:

Photo: Hilde Lotz-Bauer Photo: Hilde Lotz-Bauer

Leica I first built in 1927

Leica 1
By © Kameraprojekt Graz 2015 / Wikimedia Commons 

Leica II first built in 1932

Leica II
Display camera at V&A Photo: Robbie Griffiths

We discovered on our 2022 visit to the Hertziana, that Hilde occasionally also used a 6x6cm Rolleiflex camera. Here's a photo held by Hertziana:

Foto: Hilde Lotz-Bauer from the Hertziana archive
Chiesa di Sant'Anna dei Palafrenieri photographed by Hilde for Wolfgang Lotz's studies

We also have a few photos of Florence in the snow taken on a Rolleiflex. We assume therefore, that she borrowed this camera.

Rolleiflex Original

 

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