Fritz Henle

Who was Fritz Henle?

Fritz Henle was a photographer, known as "Mr. Rollei" for his use of the 2.25" square format film used in the Rolleiflex camera.

Henle was born in Dortmund, Germany in 1909 and died in Saint Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands in 1993. Called, "the last classic freelance photographer" by photohistorian, Helmut Gernsheim, Henle's career spanned more than 60 years, during which he amassed an archive of more than 110,000 negatives, representing images of Europe, India, Japan, Hawaii, USA, Mexico, and the Caribbean. Henle worked with fashion, portrait, travel and industrial subjects and his work was published by Life, Mademoiselle, and Harper's Bazaar magazines.

The exhibition "Fritz Henle: In Search of Beauty" celebrated the art of the photographer and the centenary of his birth. The exhibition ran from February 3 through August 2, 2009, at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.