In retrospect, commercial photography originally displays a dazzling aesthetic, bizarre exhilaration and a determined respect for creative intrepidness. When objects are presented with a stress on their factuality, as they are in the schmölz + huth atelier, they convincingly transport the belief in a mundane ambiance and the modernity of a confident generation of breakaways in the second German republic. Karl Hugo Schmölz (1917-1986) and Walde Huth (*1923) laid the groundwork in Cologne for an ideal and successful atelier symbiosis in 1958. As an architectural photographer, Schmölz possessed an eye for environment and light. Huth, a former fashion photographer, took care of composition. From the beginning the ambitious furniture industry and trendsetting furniture houses were among the most important customers. To give this current trend maximum freedom for expansion and development, schmölz + huth worked with minimalism. Through light, the compositions of lines and colors melt into optimally textured objects to form a striking unity, which points out the airiness, taste, comfort and lifestyle. It’s not all that surprising that the photographs of schmölz + huth, which with their plasticity, brilliance and color composition are still convincing today, were already constantly receiving awards in the sixties. With such high technical and aesthetic ambitions, their photos have become far more than delicacies of visual post-war history.

Dr. Boris von Brauschitsch