Heinrich Kühn

  • born Germany, 1866 - 1944
  • Photographer
  • Austrian

The grandson of a sculptor, Heinrich Kühn studied painting and music and, after a brief military stint, medicine and natural science. From this training he turned to microscopic photography, but around 1890, after continued experiments with this procedure, he gave up medicine entirely and devoted himself solely to photography. After seeing work by members of the British Linked Ring society of photographers, his Pictorialist style began to develop. He joined the Vienna Camera Club and began to exhibit his photographs. Kühn also began to publish technical articles in photographic journals and was later elected to the Linked Ring.

In 1914 Kühn established a photography school, but it lasted for only one year. He continued to photograph in the Pictorialist style through the 1930s, occasionally publishing and exhibiting his images. Kühn also continued his technical investigations and research, and in 1934 he received a patent for a film with increased light sensitivity.