Walter Ruttmann

Walter Ruttmann (28 December 1887 – 15 July 1941)[1] was a

Walter Ruttmann
German cinematographer and film director, an important German
abstract experimental film maker, along with Hans Richter, Viking
Eggeling and Oskar Fischinger. He is best known for directing the
semi-documentary 'city symphony' silent film, with orchestral
score by Edmund Meisel, in 1927, Berlin: Symphony of a
Metropolis. His audio montage Wochenende (Weekend) (1930) is
considered a major contribution in the development of audio plays.

Contents Lichtspiel Opus I (1921)

Biography Born 28 December 1887

Frankfurt am Main,
Culture and Media
Germany
Select filmography
Died 15 July 1941
Further reading (aged 53)
References Berlin, Germany
External links Occupation Film director
Years active 1921–1941

Biography Notable work Berlin: Die Sinfonie

der Großstadt
Ruttmann was born in Frankfurt am Main, the son of a wealthy
mercantilist.[2] He graduated "high school" in 1905, then began in 1907, architectural studies in Zürich,
later, in 1909, painting in Munich (later in Marburg) where he befriended Paul Klee and Lyonel
Feininger.[3]

Ruttmann was conscripted into the army in 1913, first serving in Darmstadt, and shortly after the outbreak
of the World War I was he sent to the Eastern Front, where he served as an artillery lieutenant and a gas
defense officer. After spending 1917 in a hospital, for post traumatic stress disorder, he began making
films.[2] Ruttmann had the financial means to work independently of the major German studios of the
time.[2] He founded Ruttmann-Film S.R.O. in Munich and patented an animation table, in June 1920.

His first productions were the first fully animated German cartoons, and abstract animated films.[2]
Lichtspiel: Opus I, produced between 1919 and 1921, premiered on 27 April 1921 at the Berlin
Marmorhaus, and released for German theatrical distribution in 1922, is the "oldest fully abstract motion
picture known to survive, using only animated geometric forms, arranged and shown without reference to
any representational imagery".[2]

Opus I and Opus II, were experiments with new forms of film expression, and the influence of these early
abstract films can be seen in some of the early work of Oskar Fischinger. Ruttmann and his colleagues of
the avant garde movement enriched the language of film as a medium with new formal techniques.[4]
In 1926 he worked with Julius Pinschewer on Der Aufsteig, an experimental film advertising the GeSoLei
trade fair in Düsseldorf.

In 1926, Ruttmann licensed a Wax Slicing machine from Oskar Fischinger to create special effects for The
Adventures of Prince Achmed, an animated fairy tale film, for Lotte Reiniger, making the moving
backgrounds and magic scenes.[5][6]

Ruttmann was a prominent exponent of both avant-garde art and music. His early abstractions played at the
1929 Baden-Baden Festival to international acclaim despite their being almost eight years old. Together
with Erwin Piscator, he worked on the film Melody of the World (1929), though he is best remembered for
Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt (Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis, 1927).

Weekend (Wochenende), commissioned in 1928 by Berlin Radio Hour, and presented on 13 June 1930, is a
pioneering work of musique concrète, a montage of sound clips, recorded using film optical sound track
from the Tri-Ergon process.[7][8][9] Ruttmann recorded the streets sounds of Berlin with a camera, but
without images, this was before magnetic tape. Hans Richter called it “a symphony of sound, speech-
fragments, and silence woven into a poem.”[10]

A pacifist, he traveled to Moscow in 1928 and 1929. During the Nazi period he was replaced by Leni
Riefenstahl as director of the documentary which eventually became Triumph of the Will (1935),
supposedly because Ruttmann's editing style was considered too "Marxist" and Soviet influenced. He died
in Berlin 15 July 1941 due to an embolism after leg amputation.[1]

Culture and Media

Segments from Ruttmann's experimental films Lichtspiel: Opus II (1923) and Lichtspiel: Opus IV (1925)
are used in the credits of the German neo-noir television series Babylon Berlin.[11]

Select filmography
Lichtspiel: Opus I (1920)[12][13][14][15][16]
Der Sieger (1922)
Das Wunder (1922)
Lichtspiel: Opus II (1922)[17][4][18]
Lichtspiel: Opus III (1924, with Lore
Leudesdorff)[19][20][21][15]
Lichtspiel: Opus IV (1925, with Lore
Leudesdorff)[19][22][15]
Das wiedergefundene Paradies (1925) Lichtspiel Opus II (1922)
Der Aufstieg (1926)
Spiel der Wellen (1926)
Dort wo der Rhein... (1927)
Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt (1927)[15]
Melody of the World (Melodie der Welt) (1929)[15]
Wochenende (1930) [an experimental film with sound only, no image]
Feind im Blut (1931)
In der Nacht (1931)
Steel (1933)
 Blut und Boden - Grundlagen zum neuen Reich
Altgermanische Bauernkultur (1934)
Metall des Himmels (1935)
Schiff in Not (1936)
Mannesmann (1937)
Henkel, ein deutsches Werk in seiner Arbeit (1938)
Waffenkammern Deutschlands (1940)
Deutsche Panzer (1940)
Krebs (1941) Lichtspiel Opus III (1924)

Lichtspiel Opus IV (1925)

Further reading
Cowan, Michael. Walter Ruttmann and the Cinema of Multiplicity: Avant-garde-Advertising-
Modernity. Amsterdam, NL: Amsterdam University Press, 2014. ISBN 9789089645852
Dombrug, Adrianus van. Walter Ruttmann in het beginsel. Purmerend, NL: J. Muusses,
1956.
Goergen, Jeanpaul. Walter Ruttmann: Eine Dokumentation. Berlin: Freunde der deutschen
Kinemathek, 1989. ISBN 9783927876002
Rogers, Holly and Jeremy Barham The Music and Sound of Experimental Film. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2017. ISBN 9780190469900
Quaresima, Leonard, editor. Walter Ruttmann: Cinema, pittura, ars acustica. Calliano
(Trento), Italy: Manfrini, 1994. ISBN 9788870245035

References
1. Ruttmann (https://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb12466357m).
2. Betancourt, Michael. "Walther Ruttmann's Lichtspiel Films" (https://www.cinegraphic.net/artic
le.php/20110220082757118). Cinegraphic. Retrieved 20 August 2021. "from: An Excerpt
from 'The History of Motion Graphics'"
3. Marshall, Colin (June 23, 2017). "The First Avant Garde Animation: Watch Walter
Ruttmann's Lichtspiel Opus 1 (1921)" (https://www.openculture.com/2017/06/the-first-avant-g
arde-animation-watch-walter-ruttmanns-lichtspiel-opus-1-1921.html). Open Culture.
Retrieved 20 August 2021. "“Following the First World War, Ruttmann, a painter, had moved
from expressionism to full-blown abstraction,” writes Gregory Zinman...To realize this new art
form, Ruttmann came up with, and even patented, a kind of animation technique. Once a
painter, always a painter, he found a way to make films using oils and brushes..."
 4. "Opus 2 (1921/1922)" (https://www.filmportal.de/film/lichtspiel-opus-2_e9813dffb12a45969a
e9e886b1a77759). filmportal.de. Deutsches Filminstitut.
5. Reiniger, Lotte (1970). Shadow Theatres, Shadow Films (https://archive.org/details/shadowt
heatressh0000rein). London: BT Batsford. ISBN 978-0-7134-2286-3.
6. "Lotte Reiniger's Introduction to The Adventures of Prince Achmed" (https://web.archive.org/
web/20091122140333/http://www.milestonefilms.com/pdf/AchmedPK.pdf) (PDF). Milestone
Films. 2001. pp. 9–11. Archived from the original (http://www.milestonefilms.com/pdf/Achme
dPK.pdf) (PDF) on 22 November 2009. Retrieved 25 September 2013.
7. "Weekend - Walter Ruttmann" (http://sfsound.org/tape/ruttmann.html). sfSound. Retrieved
20 August 2021.
8. Born, Erik (30 January 2015). "Walter Ruttmann, Wochenende (1930)" (https://erikborn.com/
2015/01/30/walter-ruttmann-wochenende-1930/). Erik Born. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
"Assistant Professor,... in the Department of German Studies at Cornell University"
9. "Media Art Net | Ruttmann, Walter: Weekend" (http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/weeke
nd/). 23 October 2021.
10. Remes, Justin (5 April 2020). "Ten Masterpieces of Experimental Cinema" (https://www.cupb
log.org/2020/04/05/ten-masterpieces-of-experimental-cinema/). Columbia University Press
Blog. Columbia University Press. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
11. Vallen, Mark (2018-04-03). "The Truth About Babylon Berlin" (http://art-for-a-change.com/blo
g/2018/04/the-truth-about-babylon-berlin.html). Art For A Change. Retrieved 2020-03-22.
12. Ruttmann, Walter. "LICHTSPIEL: OPUS I, 11'43, Colour, Drawing, 1921" (https://www.punto
yrayafestival.com/en/tv/films/lichtspiel_opus-i/). Punto y Raya Festival. Retrieved 20 August
2021.
13. "Lichtspiel Opus I" (https://www.centrepompidou.fr/fr/ressources/oeuvre/cdLrro). Centre
Pompidou. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
14. Moser, Jeffrey (1 January 1921). "Lichtspiel Opus I (1921)" (http://researchrepository.wvu.ed
u/structuralist_db/1207). Fixation Database of Film and Animation. West Virginia University.
Retrieved 20 August 2021.
15. "Berlin, die Sinfonie der Großstadt & Melodie der Welt Edition Filmmuseum 39" (https://ww
w.edition-filmmuseum.com/product_info.php/language/en/info/p70_Berlin--die-Sinfonie-der-
Gro-stadt---Melodie-der-Welt.html). Edition Filmmuseum Shop. Munich Film Archive,
German Federal Archives, Goethe-Institut. Retrieved 20 August 2021. "Lichtspiel Opus 1
1920, 11'; Opus 2 1922, 3'; Opus 3 1924, 3'; Opus 4 1925, 4'; Berlin, die Sinfonie der
Großstadt 1927, 65'; Melodie der Welt 1929, 48' (EDITION FILMMUSEUM is a joint project
of film archives and cultural institutions in the german-speaking part of Europe. Its ambition
is to publish film works of artistic, cultural and historical value in DVD editions that both
utilise the possibilities of digital media and meet the quality demands of the archival
profession.)"
16. "Lichtspiel Opus 1" (https://www.closeupfilmcentre.com/library/films/lichtspiel-opus-i-walter-r
uttmann/13121). Close-Up Film Centre. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
17. Moser, Jeffrey (1 January 1921). "Lichtspiel Opus II (1921)" (https://researchrepository.wvu.e
du/structuralist_db/1208/). Fixation Database of Film and Animation. West Virginia
University. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
18. "Opus 2" (https://www.closeupfilmcentre.com/library/films/opus-ii-walter-ruttmann/13122).
Close-Up Film Centre. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
19. Heinz Steike in Film als Film 1910 bis Heute, Kölnischer Kunstverein, 1977
20. Moser, Jeffrey (1 January 1924). "Lichtspiel Opus III (1924)" (http://researchrepository.wvu.ed
u/structuralist_db/1212). Fixation Database of Film and Animation. West Virginia University.
Retrieved 20 August 2021.
21. "Opus 3" (https://www.closeupfilmcentre.com/library/films/opus-iii-walter-ruttmann/13125).
Close-Up Film Centre. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
22. "Opus 4" (https://www.closeupfilmcentre.com/library/films/opus-iv-walter-ruttmann/13126).
Close-Up Film Centre. Retrieved 20 August 2021.

External links
Walter Ruttmann (https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0752193/) at IMDb
"Walther Ruttmann" (https://archive.org/details/movies?sin=&and%5b%5d=Walther+Ruttma
nn&and%5b%5d=creator%3A%22walther%20ruttmann%22&and%5b%5d=creator%3A%22
walther%20ruttman%22&and%5b%5d=creator%3A%22walther%20ruthmann%22&and%5
b%5d=creator%3A%22waltter%20ruttmann%22). Download & Streaming : Moving Image
Archive. Internet Archive.
"Walther Ruttmann" (https://www.filmportal.de/person/walther-ruttmann_073d7d0d1c4b4c53
8b0b3db7ec60e44e). filmportal.de (in German). Retrieved 20 August 2021.
Walter Ruttmann (https://www.getty.edu/vow/ULANFullDisplay?find=&role=&nation=&prev_
page=1&subjectid=500112601) Union List of Artist Names

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Walter_Ruttmann&oldid=1093591860"

This page was last edited on 17 June 2022, at 15:59 (UTC).

Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0;

additional terms may apply. By
using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.