Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art

About this Work

In 1910, August Sander set up a portrait studio in Cologne-Lindenthal, but he also went into the countryside photographing the peasants of Westerwald. This farm family was featured in the portfolio Stammappe (Archetypes), a visual preface to Sander’s lifelong documentary project that went beyond merely capturing the likenesses of his sitters to forming a comprehensive record of People of the Twentieth Century. Comprised of more than 540 portraits, it cut across all social strata to produce a remarkable record of German life prior to World War II. Photographed in traditional costumes within their actual domestic or workplace environments, Sander’s diverse subjects, presented with a new objectivity, clearly frightened the Nazis, who censored his work in 1934.