The diversity of this German photographer frequently working with nudes makes his art a perfect treat for all devotees of the nude genre. In Ommer's portfolio, one can find vintage erotic adventures, acrobats, models interacting with Icelandic landscapes, and many other fascinating shots.
Fig. 1. Leda from Do It Yourself series (artsy.net)
Fig. 2. Paris, From the Mani- Cartes Postales series, 1993 (artsy.net)
Fig. 3. Acrobats (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 4. Acrobats (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 5. Acrobats (uweommer.eu)
Making a Career Out of a Hobby
Like many talented photographers, Uwe Ommer (b. 1943) received his first camera at a relatively early age, when he was 14. This fact is all the more interesting that it happened in post-war Germany. What sparked his enthusiasm for photography wasn't elegant nudes yet. Anyway, the chosen subject - birds - required a lot of perseverance. At 18, Ommer gave up on his ornithological hobby and became an apprentice at the camera shop to make photography his profession. Soon, he worked as a camera reporter for a local press, photographing any remarkable events that happened around. Ommer's talent was first acknowledged in 1962 when his shot of the kids playing soccer won him the German Youth Photo Prize at the Photokina exhibition. In 1963, the twenty-year artist moved to Paris, only for a year to practice his French as he thought, though the stay in France turned out to be as long as life. There, he started out as an assistant to advertising photographer Jean Pierre Ronzel.
Fig. 6. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 7. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 8. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 9. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 10. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 11. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 12. Autumn (uweommer.eu)
Uniqueness and Unity
Two years later, Ommer launched his own photo studio, taking commissions for small women's magazines. His works quickly attracted the public's attention, which allowed him to conquer galleries step by step and release his first books in the 1980s. Yet, his adventurous spirit needed something more challenging than maintaining a successful career as an advertiser who works with famous brands like Pirelli. In 1995, to push the limits, he took up a documentalist project depicting many kinds of families on every continent at the turn of the millennium. Without a phone or GPS, by car, Ommer visited 130 countries in the four years. The result was a collection of 1251 photographs of more than 1000 families, displaying the uniqueness and unity of humans. In 2000, a catalog of the project was published by Taschen.
Fig. 13. Collaboration with Pirelli (uweommer.eu)
Fig. 14. Collaboration with Pirelli (uweommer.eu)
In the Premium edition you'll find more background on Ommer's risky journeys, his documentary project about Thai "ladyboys", the shots of the Belgian nudist model Marisa Papen, an extensive look into his varied portfolio, and no less than 57 additional images of Ommer's enticing nudes.
Uwe Ommer is active on Instagram
Click HERE for the exhibitionistic secrets in the nude photography of Petter Hegre
Sources: uweommer.eu; 1000families.eu; artsy.net
