There's serendipity in this photograph of the Innsbruck Hofgarten in autumn of 1914, but in Heinrich Kuhn's photographs luck is seldom the explanation. A casual glance suggests a blue vase, overflowing with orange flowers; closer inspection reveals two figures walking in the rain, viewed at an angle from above, like a ukiyo-e print. Where was Heinrich Kuhn when he shot this picture? It's a question that often arises with Kuhn's work - the photographer seemed to have wings.

In July 1907, the year that the Lumiere Brothers introduced the autochrome, Kuhn, met with Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, and Frank Eugene at Tutzing, Bavaria, to experiment with this new color process. Kühn, with his scientific background, applied Helmholtz's theory of differential focus in human vision in making his images, also playing with the expressive uses of color. He became a master of the autochrome, combining richness and delicacy through his artful manipulations of his negatives. Before the autochrome, he made color experiments using the gum bichromate process. His bold layouts make his outdoor scenes appear strikingly modern.

Kühn’s friendship with Alfred Stieglitz, which began in 1904, influenced his pictorialism toward a lighter, more abstract style; a parallel change in style also occurred among the Viennese Secessionists, with whom Kuhn often exhibited. Kuhn's work appeared frequently in Stieglitz's magazine Camera Work between 1908-1913.
But Kuhn's autochromes, less widely reproduced because of cost, deserve our attention and, fortunately, have been preserved well. Those apples draw the hand toward the pewter bowl; a century has not diminished their freshness.

Kuhn studied medicine and botany as a young man, before devoting himself to photographic experiments. He joined the Vienna Camera Club where he met Hugo Heneberg and Hans Watzek; they formed the Vienna Trifolium, a group that travelled together to Italy, Germany, and Holland, exhibiting their prints to growing public interest.

Of his c.260 surviving autochrome plates, 213 are in the Austrian National Library.

Images: unless otherwise noted are from the collection of the Musee d'Orsay, Paris and the Anzenberger Gallery, Vienna.

Note: The current retrospective on tour - Heinrich Kuhn: Perfect Photography - is curated by Monika Faber, Albertina Museum, Vienna; Françoise Heilbrun, Musée d’Orsay, Paris; and Anne Tucker, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.