Visual History

In the field of science, image research has steadily increased in scope and importance since the mid-1980s. Photography played a key role here. Unlike textual sources, it offers an immediate view - of people and things, of cities, landscapes and interiors. Up until now, the visual history itself often focused on the pictures themselves. But who produces them, who chooses them and distributes them?
This work area focuses on the actors and institutions involved in image production: the agents of the images. The subject of the research, in addition to the aesthetic effect, are the social conditions of the production, distribution and canonization of pictorial collections.

Forschung

Projekte

Work, Migration and Happiness. Photographic appropriation of East German societies in the 1960s to 1990s

 Axel Doßmann

Visual History Study
Associated Project

The research project examines photographs and visual discourses on significant themes of economic, political and socio-cultural development: work, migration, social ideals and happiness. A distinction is made between state promises of happiness and individual and social striving for happiness and a fulfilled life.

Felice Schragenheim with suitcase gramophone on the terrace, Berlin 1934; Jüdisches Museum Berlin, Inv.-Nr. 2006/37/252, Donation of Elisabeth Wust.

German-Jewish Private Photography 1928-1938

 Robert Mueller-Stahl

Associated PhD project

The project investigates German-Jewish experiences at the transition from the Weimar Republic to the National Socialist regime through the lens of private photography.

Photographs of the Long Wende, 1985-1995

 Anja Tack

Research and exhibition project

Fotografien der langen Wende focusses on little-known images of the East German transformation process. The exhibition examines the upheaval of 1989/90 in the context of the late GDR and the early 1990s.

Screenshot der Webseite Visual History, Foto: Christine Bartlitz

Visual History
Online Repository for Historical Visual Research

 Christine Bartlitz, Karsten Borgmann

The online repository visual-history.de, hosted by the ZZF, serves as a platform for historical research on visual sources and phenomena. It provides up-to-date insights into the growing community of visual historians and their activities, and supports the formation of professional networks.

Photo credit: CC BY NC ND GHWK

Photo albums of German soldiers from the attack on Poland in 1939

 Svea Hammerle

Associated PhD project

This project puts the (soldier’s) photo album at the center of its investigation and examines the narrativity of this type of source. Individual images are analyzed using the serial iconographic method and evaluated by examining recurring motifs and photographic codes in order to draw conclusions about the mentality and ideological tendencies of the Wehrmacht soldiers.

Photographs of the Long Wende, 1985-1995

 Isabel Enzenbach

Research and exhibition project

Fotografien der langen Wende focusses on little-known images of the East German transformation process. The exhibition examines the upheaval of 1989/90 in the context of the late GDR and the early 1990s.

Family in an Audi 80 in front of 1970 built residential houses near Kästdorf for guest workers of the Volkswagenwerk Wolfsburg. Photo: Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F040746-0034 / Schaack, Lothar / CC-BY-SA 3.0, Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-F040746-0034, Wolfsburg, Gastarbeiterfamilie mit ihrem Auto, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE

Strange pictures. Photographic Identity Constructions of "(Late) Resettlers" and "Guest Workers" in Stern und Spiegel 1950-1998

 Violetta Rudolf

Associated Phd project

With a diachronic study, the pictorial representation of "guest workers" and "(late) resettlers" in the German print media between 1955 and 1998 is to be analyzed in the PhD project. The research focuses on the question as to whether people with other ethnic backgrounds are also displayed differently at pictures. The sources for this work are photographs, photographic storytelling and photo collages of the German magazines Spiegel and Stern.

Good News or Bad News? Alternative Agencies in a Common World (1960s - 1990s)

Leonie Wolters (until 2023)
Research project

Since the ‘global sixties’ and their impetus towards integration as well as dissent, an increasing number of media agencies have framed themselves as alternatives to the so-called ‘Big Four’ news agencies from the Global North. This project studies the journalists and entrepreneurs setting up these and similar agencies in order to ask what strategies they used in order to make their new kinds of news convincing to new audiences.

Selfportrait of Sibylle Bergemann. Photo: Sibylle Bergemann, Selfportrait Sibylle Bergemann, CC BY 3.0

Fading Memory?
The Success of GDR Photography and its ‘Arrival’ in the West

 Annette Schuhmann

Research project

The Academy of Arts (Akademie der Künste), Berlin, opened the exhibition ‘Fading Memories’ (Verblassende Erinnerung) in 2006, which displays works from one of the most renowned East German photographers, Sybille Bergmann. The title of the exhibition aims to present the radical changes of cities and landscapes since the time of the former GDR.

Photographic self-portraits in the Weimar Republic and under National Socialism (working title)

 Julia Dellith

Associated PhD project

The subjects of the project are photographic self-portraits taken in the German Reich between 1918 and 1945. The aim is to investigate the extent to which the political, economic and social conditions of the Weimar Republic and the Nazi era influenced the representation of the self in photography.

Fotoalbum aus der DDR, Photo: Sandra Starke

Private photo albums in the GDR

 Sandra Starke

PhD project

Private photo albums form an important part of the biographical memory of people from the former GDR. What specifics can be developed from the examination of private photography with regard to the aspects of the world of work, travel, visits to the West, socialist prestige projects and major propaganda events as well as political caesura and events?

Visual History

In the field of science, image research has steadily increased in scope and importance since the mid-1980s. Photography played a key role here. Unlike textual sources, it offers an immediate view - of people and things, of cities, landscapes and interiors. Up until now, the visual history itself often focused on the pictures themselves. But who produces them, who chooses them and distributes them?
This work area focuses on the actors and institutions involved in image production: the agents of the images. The subject of the research, in addition to the aesthetic effect, are the social conditions of the production, distribution and canonization of pictorial collections.

Forschung

Projekte

Work, Migration and Happiness. Photographic appropriation of East German societies in the 1960s to 1990s

 Axel Doßmann

Visual History Study
Associated Project

The research project examines photographs and visual discourses on significant themes of economic, political and socio-cultural development: work, migration, social ideals and happiness. A distinction is made between state promises of happiness and individual and social striving for happiness and a fulfilled life.

Felice Schragenheim with suitcase gramophone on the terrace, Berlin 1934; Jüdisches Museum Berlin, Inv.-Nr. 2006/37/252, Donation of Elisabeth Wust.

German-Jewish Private Photography 1928-1938

 Robert Mueller-Stahl

Associated PhD project

The project investigates German-Jewish experiences at the transition from the Weimar Republic to the National Socialist regime through the lens of private photography.

Photographs of the Long Wende, 1985-1995

 Anja Tack

Research and exhibition project

Fotografien der langen Wende focusses on little-known images of the East German transformation process. The exhibition examines the upheaval of 1989/90 in the context of the late GDR and the early 1990s.

Screenshot der Webseite Visual History, Foto: Christine Bartlitz

Visual History
Online Repository for Historical Visual Research

 Christine Bartlitz, Karsten Borgmann

The online repository visual-history.de, hosted by the ZZF, serves as a platform for historical research on visual sources and phenomena. It provides up-to-date insights into the growing community of visual historians and their activities, and supports the formation of professional networks.

Photo credit: CC BY NC ND GHWK

Photo albums of German soldiers from the attack on Poland in 1939

 Svea Hammerle

Associated PhD project

This project puts the (soldier’s) photo album at the center of its investigation and examines the narrativity of this type of source. Individual images are analyzed using the serial iconographic method and evaluated by examining recurring motifs and photographic codes in order to draw conclusions about the mentality and ideological tendencies of the Wehrmacht soldiers.

Photographs of the Long Wende, 1985-1995

 Isabel Enzenbach

Research and exhibition project

Fotografien der langen Wende focusses on little-known images of the East German transformation process. The exhibition examines the upheaval of 1989/90 in the context of the late GDR and the early 1990s.

Family in an Audi 80 in front of 1970 built residential houses near Kästdorf for guest workers of the Volkswagenwerk Wolfsburg. Photo: Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F040746-0034 / Schaack, Lothar / CC-BY-SA 3.0, Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-F040746-0034, Wolfsburg, Gastarbeiterfamilie mit ihrem Auto, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE

Strange pictures. Photographic Identity Constructions of "(Late) Resettlers" and "Guest Workers" in Stern und Spiegel 1950-1998

 Violetta Rudolf

Associated Phd project

With a diachronic study, the pictorial representation of "guest workers" and "(late) resettlers" in the German print media between 1955 and 1998 is to be analyzed in the PhD project. The research focuses on the question as to whether people with other ethnic backgrounds are also displayed differently at pictures. The sources for this work are photographs, photographic storytelling and photo collages of the German magazines Spiegel and Stern.

Good News or Bad News? Alternative Agencies in a Common World (1960s - 1990s)

Leonie Wolters (until 2023)
Research project

Since the ‘global sixties’ and their impetus towards integration as well as dissent, an increasing number of media agencies have framed themselves as alternatives to the so-called ‘Big Four’ news agencies from the Global North. This project studies the journalists and entrepreneurs setting up these and similar agencies in order to ask what strategies they used in order to make their new kinds of news convincing to new audiences.

Selfportrait of Sibylle Bergemann. Photo: Sibylle Bergemann, Selfportrait Sibylle Bergemann, CC BY 3.0

Fading Memory?
The Success of GDR Photography and its ‘Arrival’ in the West

 Annette Schuhmann

Research project

The Academy of Arts (Akademie der Künste), Berlin, opened the exhibition ‘Fading Memories’ (Verblassende Erinnerung) in 2006, which displays works from one of the most renowned East German photographers, Sybille Bergmann. The title of the exhibition aims to present the radical changes of cities and landscapes since the time of the former GDR.

Photographic self-portraits in the Weimar Republic and under National Socialism (working title)

 Julia Dellith

Associated PhD project

The subjects of the project are photographic self-portraits taken in the German Reich between 1918 and 1945. The aim is to investigate the extent to which the political, economic and social conditions of the Weimar Republic and the Nazi era influenced the representation of the self in photography.

Fotoalbum aus der DDR, Photo: Sandra Starke

Private photo albums in the GDR

 Sandra Starke

PhD project

Private photo albums form an important part of the biographical memory of people from the former GDR. What specifics can be developed from the examination of private photography with regard to the aspects of the world of work, travel, visits to the West, socialist prestige projects and major propaganda events as well as political caesura and events?