In November 2024, the illustrated book "Moments: GDR photographs 1956–90" by Thomas Billhardt was published. He is one of the most famous reportage photographers of the post-war period, who documented life in real existing socialism and thus provided impressive insights into everyday life in the GDR.
Image gallery
With this illustrated book, Thomas Billhardt has created a contemporary document that covers political and social events from 1956 to the reunification of Germany in 1990. His photographs impress with their thematic and stylistic diversity.
To accompany the publication of the illustrated book, the CAMERA WORK gallery is showing the exhibition of the same name, in which 20 selected works by Thomas Billhardt are presented.
Thomas Billhardt (*1937 in Chemnitz) discovered his passion for photography at an early age. At the age of 14, he began his training with his mother, who was also a photographer. He then studied at the Technical School of Applied Arts in Magdeburg. He gained his first practical experience as a factory photographer in the brown coal mine in Großkayna, before working as a publishing photographer for the postcard publisher Bild und Heimat. At the same time, he studied photography and photo design at the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig.
His diploma thesis, which focused on Berlin's Alexanderplatz, was an early example of his lifelong photographic engagement with this symbolic place.
Billhardt joined the Association of German Journalists while still a student. In the following years, he worked as a freelance photographer and built up an impressive body of work.
Thomas Billhardt's life's work up to 1999 is now owned by CAMERA WORK AG.
