Walter Peterhans
Germany (1897—1960)After studying engineering in Dresden and mathematics, philosophy and art history in Munich and Göttingen, Walter Peterhans turned to photography, completing his photographic training in Leipzig and obtaining his master photographer’s qualification in Weimar in 1926. In 1929 Hannes Meyer invited him to join the Bauhaus in Dessau, where he became head of the photography department and developed an approach associated with the Neues Sehen (New Vision) movement. In 1938 Mies van der Rohe, whom he had met at the Bauhaus, brought him to Chicago to teach visual training, analysis and art history at the Armour Institute, later the Illinois Institute of Technology. After WWII he remained in the United States, while maintaining links with Germany and Europe; in 1953 he taught as a guest lecturer at the Ulm School of Design, where he directed its foundational course. He continued teaching at the IIT until his death from a heart attack in Stetten bei Stuttgart in 1960.
