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Continued... Rauhauser’s works run the gamut from documentary photography to landscapes to his personal favorite, his Object Series, which features simple and symbolic cultural icons: a boot, a Coke bottle, a meat grinder, a Mickey Mouse mask. Now Professor Emeritus at the Center for Creative Studies, Rauhauser has no doubt inspired legions of photographers during the 30 years he taught at CCS as well as through his own example as a photographer for more than 60 years. Born in Detroit in 1918, Rauhauser has been fascinated with photography since he was a teen at Detroit’s Cooley High School and watched on while a friend worked on a film processing assignment. Although he went on to earn a bachelor’s degree in architectural engineering from the University of Detroit, Rauhauser was so intrigued with the process, he joined the Silhouette Camera Club in 1938. "At that time, [that was] the only place you could do anything in photography," he says. He began to exhibit his work at Club-sponsored shows at the DIA and beyond. All the while he was doing his photography he was working as an architectural engineer. On a business trip in New York City, he saw a show at the Museum of Modern Art by Henri Cartier-Bresson, the legendary documentary-style photographer who died in 2004. "I realized there was more to this photography than I ever dreamed of," recalls Rauhauser, who had realized the pictorialism style of the club was not for him. "I changed my total way of working. I started shooting in the streets as opposed to still lifes. Cartier-Bresson changed the whole way."
In 1964, Rauhauser opened what he says was the first pure photographic gallery in the Midwest and likely the country, Group Four Gallery, on the corner of Indiana and Grand River Ave. in Detroit. "It was a little ahead of time. People weren’t buying photography," says Rauhauser, who had to close the doors in 1968. In 1970, he was offered a teaching position at the Center for Creative Studies by his friend Bob Vigiletti, then chairman of the photography department. Rauhauser, who’d been lecturing on the history of photography, decided to finally get paid full-time for it. He began teaching that year at CCS where he remained until his retirement in 2002. Here
he shares some thoughts on his craft... Who has most influenced you as a photographer? Cartier-Bresson really kicked it off in the beginning. My favorite artist is Matisse but the medium is so different it’s hard to say you can be influenced by him. I like the way [Matisse] keeps to realistic subjects but [also] the way he distorts them and makes them into design problems in a way. And the color is so wonderful. I don’t use color. Why don’t you shoot in color? What I’m interested in is the subject matter and the organizational aspects of the scene. I think the color distracts you from the subject. I don’t see color. I see in black and white. I see the design in the scene. Can you describe your style? Or a philosophy of your work?
You say you don’t see yourself as an artist, but rather as a camera operator. Why? I associate art with doing things with your hands. You do art because you want to express something inside you. I don’t particularly want to do that. But I feel I have to have that knowledge and background and feeling. Where I think the pictorialists went wrong is they weren’t satisfied being photographers, they had to be artists. They resorted to all sorts of manipulative systems so they could get their hands involved to do art because they weren’t satisfied that photography was a real qualified, they called, art. I don’t call it art. What’s important is always the subject, not the doing of it. I would say I’m documenting whatever I photograph. I think there has to be some sensitivity and understanding of art. What would you say is most distinctive about your style? What says: That is a Bill Rauhauser photograph? I’m not sure you can do that with photography. This again is what separates photography from traditional artwork, where you can develop a style. Once you develop a style in photography, there’s only two ways. One is the subject matter – like the Object series may have become a style. You can call it a style in a way, it really isn’t style but it’s a way of recognizing what I’ve done. The other way is once you begin to produce a real style, which comes from you, you have to distort the thing and this is why painters can develop a style. Photographers can’t really do that without destroying the pure photographic nature. Some photographers would disagree with that. I don’t
feel like I need to distinguish myself [style-wise]. I’m content
to let the subject speak for itself. That’s why I don’t title
them. I prefer they be as impersonal as possible. It’s not about
me, it’s about the subject. If I feel I’m putting my stamp
on it, than I’ve got to back off and say, Wait a minute, this is
not what I want to do. You said your personal favorite among your photographs are those in your Object Series, like these on your walls – a meat grinder, and a spark plug. I’ve been doing these since the 1960s. It’s been ongoing. I probably have about 150 photos. They are different from the people. I found a statement by a Basque poet: "The noblest purpose of an object is to be contemplated." That sort of gave it an added punch. I just felt the objects had something to say about our culture. You said the most exciting photographs to you are photos totally lacking in traditional composition. Why so? I did a series called Asymptotes. [An asymptote, he explains, is a line generated by an algebraic equation that starts vertically down, bends toward the X axis but never reaches it.] I tried to find subject matter that was totally uninteresting and had no hint of good composition or good design. It’s impossible to do that because no matter what you photograph it’s going to remind somebody of something. The kind of photograph I want to make is impossible, but I’m getting as close as I can. Your printing process has changed over the years, it’s less fussy. You used to do a lot of burning and dodging, something you called, a "hangover" from what you learned in the camera club. To me a
perfect print, other than the subject matter, is a print that needs
no burning, no dodging, no spotting. Probably eight out of 10 are done
that way. The only thing I can do when I’m shooting is organize
the composition. I can’t get certain places dark and light. But
I used to think the corners had to be dark. Now I print them as straight
as possible. What keeps you motivated as a photographer?
What are you most proud of in your career or work? The variety of things that I’ve been involved in, from the camera club to the gallery to the "Family of Man" to teaching to working with the DIA curating shows. All those things. I haven’t just concentrated on one thing. I’ve even collected, prints, books, cameras. You had a pretty impressive photo collection at one time. During the 1960s and 1970s, you were one of the first people in the area to collect photography. How many did you have? At one
time, I had about 350 prints – Edward Weston, [László]
Moholy-Nagy, Bill Brandt. I bought a Weston for $200 and
got two Ansel Adams for $75 each. Besides banging on your electronic drum set, do you have other hobbies? Reading. I like to pick a subject and pursue it. Right now it’s WWII, European, the Nazis, Churchill. Then I’ll pick up something else. I spend at least one or two days at Border’s. Mostly non-fiction. What’s next for you? I’m working on a book about small homes in Detroit. In all the walking I did all over the city for 40 years and my background in architecture, I saw all these little homes that were just beautiful little places. I just photographed them because I liked them. Finally, if you could share what you feel is the most important thing about making successful photographs, what would it be? Excitement.
Inspiration. Just have to do it. Photography is easy to learn. You don’t
have to go to school but you have to be inspired. That you can’t
not do it. I think that’s the secret of it. View
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