Lothar Wolleh

Lothar Wolleh was a well known environmental photographer, who took photographs of over 100 painters, sculptors and performance artists until the late sixties. Shooting on a medium format 6x6 frame, Wolleh's photographs nearly always adopted a symmetrical composition creating an equally balanced image with his subject positioned in the centre of the image, creating directional lines towards them and directing the viewer's attention on the person.  

Jacques Mahé de la Villaglé, 1971

René Magritte, 1967

Man Ray, 1967

Wolleh often positions his sitters in an environment that is related to them, their personality or their profession, and he sometimes uses comical props or certain compositions to elaborate on this link between the subject and their environment. The photograph above of Magritte which is simple yet very striking, shows this idea of linking the two; Wolleh has purposely dressed the artist in a matching suit to that which is shown in his painting and he is positioned in a way that somehow looks as though he belongs in the artwork, and has perhaps just stepped out of it.