Annelise Kretschmer

Annelise Kretschmer (1903 – 1987) was a German portrait photographer.

Kretschmer is best known for her depictions of women in Germany in the early 20th century and is credited with helping construct the 'Neue Frau' or New Woman image of modern femininity.

Biography Kretschmer was born in Dortmund, Germany. Her parents owned a clothing store in the region. Her father was born into a Jewish family, but was a practicing Protestant. He ran an antiques shop. Her sister Margot was born in 1905, but died as a young woman Kretschmer's brother, Wilhelm, was two years her senior.

After Kretschmer left high school in 1919, her parents transferred her to the 'daughter training institute' of Dr.Weiss in Weimar. At the school she studied drawing and bookbinding for two years, but was not enthused with it. The exhibition housed over one thousand photographs and 13 exhibition rooms. The exhibition today is considered of monumental importance to modernism, as associate professor of humanities & fine arts, Vanessa Rocco states, "Even in its own time, the exhibition was being historicized." The exhibition ran from 18 May–July 7, 1920. The exhibitions started in Stuttgart and travelled to Zurich, Berlin, Danzig, Vienna, Agram, and Munich. After the war, the passport clientele came from many kinds of people, and the familial portrait shots were usually commissioned by circles within business or industry.

Kretschmer ran her portrait studio for a total of fifty years, and she photographed some of the same families through multiple generations. She felt that "The success of a portrait ultimately lies with the photographer." Her work after the 1950s consisted of mainly artists, for example, sculptor Ewald Mataré and photographer Albert Renger-Patzsch were both photographed by Kretschmer.