Robert Petschow

Robert Petschow (German, 1888-1945) was a balloon pilot and freelance photographer. His photographs appeared in the renowned photographic yearbook Das deutsche Lichtbild (The German Annual of Photography), where his work was presented alongside photographers like Karl Blossfeldt, Albert Renger-Patzsch, and Erich Salomon, among others. The hugely popular illustrated book Land der Deutschen (Land of the Germans), which contained many of Petschow’s photographs, was published in 1931 and edited by Robert Diesel. In the same year Petschow traveled to Egypt with the zeppelin LZ 127 (Graf Zeppelin) in order to document the journey photographically. In 1936, Petschow joined the German air force, aged 48, as captain. He died in October 1945 in Haldensleben. His archive of 30.000 aerial photographs was lost when his Berlin apartment was bombed.