I about me

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Photography has been a part of my life since I was 15 and has always been an important part of my now rather long life.
It all started with a Bilora Boy, which I still own, of course. My next camera was an Edixa Reflex, the result of six weeks of hard work as a labourer on a building site. My first SLR.
Soon I had my first small darkroom, where I developed black-and-white films and enlarged my first photo prints. No matter where I lived in the years that followed, I always had that board on the bathtub, the developing drum and the enlarger.
The developing drum and the black bag for loading the films also accompanied me on my three-month road trip from Pretoria (South Africa) via East Africa, India and Asia Minor to Paderborn (Germany). Wherever I found running water that was reasonably clean, I developed the films, as undeveloped films did not keep for long in tropical temperatures. This often led to bizarre situations: on one side of a tree, my films fluttered in the breeze as they dried, while on the other side of the tree, giraffes chewed on the leaves.
At the time, I had two Nikon camera bodies and three lenses (28, 50, 135 mm) with me. When entering India, the customs officer insisted that only one Nikon camera body could be imported unfortunately,  the second one had to stay with him. Fortunately, he then discovered in my passport that I was a doctor and asked for a list of foods he should avoid due to his gallstones. Now the second body was also marked with a white chalk cross, so I was able to pass through customs with both bodies.

After that, I travelled the world for many years with my wife and an analogue Hasselblad (please note the order) and developed Cibachrome prints in my own laboratory.The Hasselblad case weighed a mere 7.5 kg, which led me to consider a less weighty alternative as I got older.This led me straight to the impressive Sony full-frame system cameras, of course also with Zeiss lenses (Zeiss Batis 25, 85 mm), case weight 2.5 kg.                     

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Throughout all these years, I have been particularly touched by the „fraternité des hommes“. Despite globalisation, people on this wonderful planet live their own personal lives in their own little worlds. If you travel with an open heart, they allow travellers to share in this for a moment. In their happiness, their fears, their sorrow. Somewhere, this fraternité des hommes shines through: in a smile, a wink, a long, open gaze, an exchange of very personal gestures. And sometimes it is possible to capture these precious moments photographically.
Another topic has moved me throughout my life: nature and nature conservation.
This has resulted in an online library, a foundation, and a forest kindergarten.
(https://sennearchiv.de, https://www.naturschutz-stiftung-senne.de, https://waldkindergarten-hoevelhof.de/)
And, of course, photos of those countless moments when nature touched me, amazed me, gave me strength.
Through the influence of my wife, the painter Anne Lubek, a third theme developed: fine art photography. How can I incorporate all the wonders I encounter into an artistic process and transform them photographically? The implementation of this question is an ongoing challenge.
In the gallery, travel and project pages of this website, you will find the results of this lifelong curiosity. I would be delighted if you would accompany me for a while.
And remember:
‘One eye of the photographer looks wide open through the viewfinder, the closed one looks into his own soul.’
(Henri Cartier Bresson)