Helmar Lerski 1871, Strasbourg, France-1956, Zürich, Switzerland

  • Helmar Lerski. Self-portrait

  • Helmar Lerski occupies a singular position in twentieth-century photography. For him, light was not merely a technical condition but the central instrument of artistic construction.

     

    “Light is proof that a photographer can create freely, following his mind’s eye, like a painter, designer, or sculptor,” he wrote—an assertion that succinctly defines his approach. Illumination in Lerski’s work functions as structure, contour, and narrative force.

     

    After more than two decades as an actor in the United States, Lerski turned to photography, later moving fluidly between still image and cinema. His theatrical background proved formative. Drawing upon stage lighting techniques, he approached portraiture as a spatial and dramatic composition rather than a neutral record. Light became a sculptural medium capable of reshaping the face and reorganizing perception.

     

    By the 1910s and 1920s, Lerski had developed a highly distinctive portrait language. Rather than pursuing strict likeness or individual physiognomic detail, he sought to reveal archetypal presence. Through sharply contrasted illumination, he filtered out anecdotal elements and concentrated attention on structural form. Using mirrors and carefully directed beams, he produced dramatic modulations of shadow and highlight, transforming the human face into a sculpted topography—at times resembling relief or abstraction.

     

    These effects were achieved without elaborate technical apparatus. Lerski relied on a large-format camera, mirrors, and contact prints. The innovation resided not in machinery but in conception: a rigorous redefinition of portraiture as a study of transformation. He regarded his principal breakthrough as the ability to demonstrate how shifts in camera angle and lighting could generate profound metamorphoses within a single face, revealing multiple psychological states through purely formal means.

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    Among his most consequential bodies of work is the series commonly known as Jewish Faces, initiated after his travels to Palestine beginning in 1931. These portraits combined expressive intensity with formal experimentation and quickly provoked ideological, national, and religious debate. Lerski conceived the project as an exploration of collective identity through typology. As he stated: “I want to show only the prototype in all its off-shoots… so intensely that the prototype is recognizable in all later branches.”

     

    The series later expanded to include Arabic Faces and Working Hands, broadening its anthropological and social scope. Exhibited at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art in 1945, these works underscored Lerski’s ambition to construct a visual archive shaped as much by light and form as by historical circumstance.

     

    Lerski’s engagement with cinema further extended his formal investigations. His films, including Avodah and Adamah, are marked by rhythmic editing, dynamic composition, and a strong graphic sensibility. Contemporary critics drew parallels between his cinematic language and the montage experiments of Sergei Eisenstein as well as the visual orchestration of Leni Riefenstahl. Across media, his practice maintained a consistent emphasis on structure, light, and the expressive capacity of the human figure.

     

    Today, Helmar Lerski is regarded as a major innovator of twentieth-century photography. Alongside figures such as Alfred Stieglitz and Edward Steichen, he is recognized for redefining the possibilities of photographic portraiture and for advancing a modernist understanding of light as a generative artistic force.

     

    Works by Helmar Lerski have been exhibited and are held in major institutions, including:

    Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv

    Museum of Modern Art, New York

    Israel Museum, Jerusalem

    Musée d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaïsme, Paris

    Albertina, Vienna

    Currier Museum of Art, Manchester, NH

    Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto

  • Works
  • Installation shots
    Helmar Lerski Series (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Helmar Lerski. Lerski Pictures Series, 1911–1914 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Helmar Lerski. Everyday Faces, 1928–1931 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Helmar Lerski. Arabs and Jews, 1931–1935 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Helmar Lerski. Hands Portraits, 1944 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Helmar Lerski. Metamorphosis Through Light, 1936 (View more details about this item in a popup).

    Helmar Lerski Series

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    'Der Mensch – Mein Bruder'

  • Collection of 88 vintage prints – a layout for the book ‘Der Mensch – Mein Bruder’ (Mankind. My Brother) (1958)...

    ‘Der Mensch – Mein Bruder’ (Mankind. My Brother), 1958

    Collection of 88 vintage prints – a layout for the book ‘Der Mensch – Mein Bruder’ (Mankind. My Brother) (1958) – includes works from five significant series: Lerski Pictures (1911–1914), Everyday Faces (1928–1931), Arabs and Jews (1931–1935), Metamorphosis Through Light (1936), and Hands (1944).

     

    A compelling retrospective tribute published shortly after Lerski’s death, featuring silvery photogravures, includes essays by renowned writers Berthold Viertel and Arnold Zweig,

    as well as film director Louis Fürnberg. The tribute declared Lerski “a key influence on Germany’s Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) movement and a pioneering figure whose ‘eerie and transfixing’ expressionist style made him a leading Weimar cinematographer and portrait photographer.”

  • Lerski Pictures (1911–1914)

  • Just beginning the way of a photographer Lerski widely uses the theatrical experience and utilizes the effects of forced stagey... Just beginning the way of a photographer Lerski widely uses the theatrical experience and utilizes the effects of forced stagey... Just beginning the way of a photographer Lerski widely uses the theatrical experience and utilizes the effects of forced stagey... Just beginning the way of a photographer Lerski widely uses the theatrical experience and utilizes the effects of forced stagey...

    Just beginning the way of a photographer Lerski widely uses the theatrical experience and utilizes the effects of forced stagey lighting in the portraits of his friends-actors. Thereafter the unique style of Lerski portrait, uncommon for America of that time, starts coming out: contrasting light that enables to exclude all the individual, uncommon and underlines the universal, archetypical. Later this style was named "Lerski Pictures".

  • Everyday Faces (1928–1931)

  • After working as a film cameraman for nearly a decade, in 1928 Lerski was preparing to return to portrait photography.... After working as a film cameraman for nearly a decade, in 1928 Lerski was preparing to return to portrait photography.... After working as a film cameraman for nearly a decade, in 1928 Lerski was preparing to return to portrait photography.... After working as a film cameraman for nearly a decade, in 1928 Lerski was preparing to return to portrait photography....

    After working as a film cameraman for nearly a decade, in 1928 Lerski was preparing to return to portrait photography. Now he was interested in depicting artists, intellectuals, and very important persons from cultural and political spheres. Between 1929 and 1931 his images appeared in 'Vogue', 'Die Dame', 'die neue linie', 'Scherl's Magazine', 'Sport I'm Bild', and 'Die Weite Welt'. After a twelve year hiatus, the photographer managed once again to gain public recognition extremely quickly.

     

    During this period Lerski's studio (and living quarters) were frequented not only by celebrities, but also by unknown models. The unknowns were often unemployed workers, sent over by the unemployment office. Thus, he initiated his series 'Köpfe des Altags' (Everyday Faces).

     

    With a cut-out, an optical close-up, he tried to capture the essence of a face: eyes, nose, mouth. However, it was not recognizable features, not the individual appearance of his models with interested Lerski, but rather the undefinable, the "inner structure", which he hoped to "illuminate and penetrate", by utilizing a technical medium, a materialist method of image making.

  • Arabs and Jews (1931–1935)

  • One of Lerski’s most important series revolved around the portraits from “Arabs and Jews, Palestine.” After multiple trips to Palestine... One of Lerski’s most important series revolved around the portraits from “Arabs and Jews, Palestine.” After multiple trips to Palestine... One of Lerski’s most important series revolved around the portraits from “Arabs and Jews, Palestine.” After multiple trips to Palestine... One of Lerski’s most important series revolved around the portraits from “Arabs and Jews, Palestine.” After multiple trips to Palestine...

    One of Lerski’s most important series revolved around the portraits from “Arabs and Jews, Palestine.”

     

    After multiple trips to Palestine beginning in 1931, Helmar Lerski left Berlin for Palestine. He had succeeded in interesting French publisher Charles Peignot in a new book with a concept focused on depicting Jewish people as “a document of the Jewish race... of lasting value and authoritative import”: “I want to show only the prototype in all its offshoots, and, what is more, I want to show him so intensely that the prototype is recognizable in all later branches.”

     

    Driven by the desire to officially document the Jewish national character in all its significance and grandeur, Lerski created a series of Judaic portraits that transcended mere artistic expression, sparking ideological, nationalist, and religious debates. Despite the controversy, Lerski received strong support from the intellectual elite of the time, including Albert Einstein, who later wrote introductions for Lerski’s “Jewish Faces” catalog. The series expanded to include “Arab Faces” and “Working Hands,” which were later exhibited at the Tel Aviv Museum in 1945.

  • In his frequent correspondence with Albert Einstein, Lerski reflected on the state of the Jewish community. Einstein, aware of Lerski’s idea as early as 1930, wrote to him: “The Jews today are more a national than a religious community. The documentation of this type, as difficult as it may be, thus fulfills an active wish.”

     

    In 1932, Lerski settled in Tel Aviv, where he remained until his return to Europe in 1948. He continued his portraiture work, expanding his concept for Jewish portraits to include the series “Palestinian Portraits” and “Arab Portraits.”

  • Metamorphosis Through Light (1936)

  • At the beginning of 1936, Helmar Lerski started a new portraiture series. His model was a Jewish worker, who Lerski... At the beginning of 1936, Helmar Lerski started a new portraiture series. His model was a Jewish worker, who Lerski... At the beginning of 1936, Helmar Lerski started a new portraiture series. His model was a Jewish worker, who Lerski...

    At the beginning of 1936, Helmar Lerski started a new portraiture series. His model was a Jewish worker, who Lerski called 'Uschatz'. In the next three months he produced 175 images of the man remembered as a jack of all trades in Lerski's office.

     

    Lerski had conceived his metamorphosis project as early as 1930. When asked about further plans, he responded to the film critic, Hans Feld, that he later wanted to "create a book of portraits of somebody. Fifty images of one and the same person".

     

    Working on the rooftop terrace of Lerski's flat in Tel Aviv in the bright, morning sun, Lerski continually directed the light towards his model's face, using a great number of mirrors. Designated by Lerski as his magnum opus, 'Metamorphosis through Light' was to "furnish proof, that a photographer can create freely, following his mind's eye, like a painter, or sculpture."

  • Hands Portraits (1944)

  • In 1944, Lerski returned to 'Hand Portraits', originally conceived in 1930. This series depicted hands in action, but as staged... In 1944, Lerski returned to 'Hand Portraits', originally conceived in 1930. This series depicted hands in action, but as staged... In 1944, Lerski returned to 'Hand Portraits', originally conceived in 1930. This series depicted hands in action, but as staged... In 1944, Lerski returned to 'Hand Portraits', originally conceived in 1930. This series depicted hands in action, but as staged...

    In 1944, Lerski returned to "Hand Portraits", originally conceived in 1930. This series depicted hands in action, but as staged activities. Hand, pars pro toto, were thus interpreted as symbols of human creations, as a tool of the creator. As in 'Everyday Faces' series, Lerski classified the hands by occupation, hoping to point to the idealized categories.

     

    In this series Lerski turns the paper into skin: every fold, every muscle and even the bone structure become readable writing. This revelatory shaping of the surface is only possible through light art.

     

    "It's all in the skin, it only depends on where the light falls", said Lerski.

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