Horst Wenzel - January 3, 2007

In that last century when photography began there were photographers in the United States who made a living taking portraits of young children and also when they were dying. Some of these photographers thought that somehow you might photograph a child and get that soul/spirit as it emerged.

In some sort of similar fashion I wonder when I take my portraits if some of that inner spirit/soul emerges and with light exposes my film, also travels from my subject to my camera.

I took this Polaroid of my friend and camera repairman Horst Wenzel on 3 January 2007. He died in 2023. It was what you call a first take as I then continued with 120 b+w Kodak Plus-X and my Mamiya RB-67. I took exactly four exposures and quit. The best is the Polaroid. He is holding a stereo camera he designed and built.

As I look at this scanned Polaroid there is something there that transcends that normal good portrait. There is an intelligence and presence in this shot. I was lucky, but I believe that it had a lot to do with that spirit that emanated from the good man that Wenzel was. Behind him is a painting of his father who was a German officer on the Russian front in WWII.

He was a fastidious man who when he repaired my cameras he would use brand new screws if the old ones look damaged. He told me, “Alex I don’t want anybody to know that I was inside your camera.”

I am almost sure that all my cameras have something of Horst Wenzel in their insides.