Hugo Erfurth; B黿enstein & Company; Mother and Child; paper; heliogravure; image size: height: 16.5 cm; width: 12.3 cm; monogrammed and dated: recto and left in the printing forme: HE [ligated]; 1903; inscribed: recto at the lower platemark: in engraved typescript and right: Georg B黿enstein & Comp; Berlin; hel.; lower left: Hugo Erfurth Dresden; stamp: cardboard verso: lower left: Sammlung Juhl; stamp location of the Staatliche Landesbildstelle Hamburg; handwritten in lead: 26; 30; inventory stamp of the Staatliche; portrait photography; mother; child; dress; hilly landscape; fashion; clothing; hat; double portrait; At the beginning of the 20th century; the artist's portrait was printed on the reverse side of the plate Along with Rudolph D黨rkoop and Nicola Perscheid; Hugo Erfurth is one of the most famous professional photographers in Germany. After completing an apprenticeship as a photographer; he opened his own studio in Dresden at the age of only 22. Soon Erfurth orientated himself towards the up-and-coming pictorialist photography; participated in numerous amateur photographic exhibitions from 1894 onwards and managed to make a name for himself both as an artistically ennobled amateur and successful professional photographer. Portraits are central to his work; which he began taking in 1906 in his new studio; a classicist palace; in a stylishly elegant ambience; appealing to the wealthy bourgeoisie. He also produced numerous portraits of famous personalities; including K鋞he Kollwitz; Otto Dix and Joachim Ringelnatz. While his studies around 1905 still show full-length figures depicted in an atmospheric way; from the 1920s onward the focus is on the face; which is photographed against a simple monochrome background. Here; his pictorial approach corresponds to the portrait of classical modernism; whereby the technique of oil printing emphasizes the softness and materiality of the pigments and at the same time places the portraits in the art-photographic tra