Age, Biography and Wiki

Helga Paris (Helga Steffens) was born on 21 May, 1938 in Gollnow, Germany, is a German photographer (1938–2024). Discover Helga Paris's Biography, Age, Height, Physical Stats, Dating/Affairs, Family and career updates. Learn How rich is she in this year and how she spends money? Also learn how she earned most of networth at the age of 85 years old?

Popular As Helga Steffens
Occupation Photographer
Age 85 years old
Zodiac Sign Taurus
Born 21 May 1938
Birthday 21 May
Birthplace Gollnow, Germany
Date of death 5 February, 2024
Died Place Berlin, Germany
Nationality Germany

We recommend you to check the complete list of Famous People born on 21 May. She is a member of famous Photographer with the age 85 years old group.

Helga Paris Height, Weight & Measurements

At 85 years old, Helga Paris height not available right now. We will update Helga Paris's Height, weight, Body Measurements, Eye Color, Hair Color, Shoe & Dress size soon as possible.

Physical Status
Height Not Available
Weight Not Available
Body Measurements Not Available
Eye Color Not Available
Hair Color Not Available

Who Is Helga Paris's Husband?

Her husband is Ronald Paris

Family
Parents Not Available
Husband Ronald Paris
Sibling Not Available
Children 2

Helga Paris Net Worth

Her net worth has been growing significantly in 2023-2024. So, how much is Helga Paris worth at the age of 85 years old? Helga Paris’s income source is mostly from being a successful Photographer. She is from Germany. We have estimated Helga Paris's net worth, money, salary, income, and assets.

Net Worth in 2024 $1 Million - $5 Million
Salary in 2024 Under Review
Net Worth in 2023 Pending
Salary in 2023 Under Review
House Not Available
Cars Not Available
Source of Income Photographer

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Timeline

1938

Helga Paris (née Steffens; 21 May 1938 – 5 February 2024) was a German photographer, known for her photographs of daily life in East Germany.

1940

She believed that much of her photographic passion and skill were acquired from two aunts who were enthusiastic photographers, constantly taking pictures from the 1940s through the 1960s, which Paris carefully preserved in a collection of show boxes adapted for the purpose.

1945

In May 1945, she celebrated her seventh birthday, while the war ended in defeat for Germany.

Her father and two brothers were still away, but in the meantime frontier changes mandated by the victorious powers and large-scale ethnic cleansing forced Helga's mother to flee with her two daughters.

They ended up in Zossen, a small town a little to the south of Berlin.

There she was raised by a community of mostly women, many of whom worked.

She was introduced to photography by her aunts who took many photographs.

1956

In Zossen, she completed school successfully with the Abitur in 1956.

1960

She then studied fashion design at the School of Engineering for the Clothing Industry (Ingenieurschule für Bekleidungsindustrie) in Berlin until 1960.

She undertook an internship at Mahala-Problem-Cigarettes.

She then worked briefly as a lecturer of costume studies at a trade school, and worked as a commercial graphic designer for the DEWAG advertisement agency in Berlin.

She was a costume designer at the Berliner Studenten- und Arbeitertheater, a theatre of students and workers, which introduced her to the artists' circle around Wolf Biermann.

In 1960, she started to take photographs with a 6×6 Flexaret camera.

1961

During this time she met the painter Ronald Paris; they were married from 1961 to 1974.

Through her husband, she was able to establish contacts in the East German art scene of the time.

She had developed a passion for photography but, like many of the leading photographers of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was often described as self-taught.

1966

Paris and her husband lived in the Prenzlauer Berg quarter of Berlin from 1966.

1967

Paris began taking photographs seriously around 1967.

She was influenced by the work of Edvard Munch, Max Beckmann, Francis Bacon, and Werner Held.

Between 1967 and 1968, she worked in the photo-laboratory of Walli Baucik.

1969

Her first free-lance job, in 1969, was to photograph slaughtering at a home in Thuringia; in 1970, she shot fashion photographs for the youth magazine neues leben.

1972

In 1972, she joined the Verband Bildender Künstler der DDR association of visual artists, which was virtually a prerequisite for success in what was now her chosen career.

1974

She photographed theatre, and then turned to a series of people and streetscapes, such as Garbage Collectors (1974), Berliner Kneipen (1975), Leipzig Hauptbahnhof (1981), self portraits, and houses and faces from Halle for an exhibition that was cancelled in 1986.

Her works, shown internationally, received recognition especially after German reunification as documents of a past.

Helga Steffens, daughter of Gertrud Steffens and typesetter Wilhelm Steffens, was born just over a year before the outbreak of the Second World War in Gollnow, a small town then in the north of Germany.

She documented social conditions in several series: Müllfahrer (Garbage collectors, 1974), Berliner Kneipen (Berlin bars, 1975), Möbelträger (Movers, 1975), Altersheim (Senior citizens' home, 1980), Berliner Jugendliche (Berlin youths) and Leipzig Hauptbahnhof (Leipzig main station, both 1981/82).

1975

In 1975, she photographed scenes from theatre productions by Benno Besson at the Berlin Volksbühne and by Alexander Lang and Friedo Solter at the Deutsches Theater.

1978

She presented her first personal exhibition in 1978 at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts.

Her work was focused increasingly on people and streetscapes, initially in Berlin where many of her subjects were neighbours and friends.

1981

She took photographs of Zossen where she had grown up, titled Erinnerungwn an Z. (Memories of Z.), self portraits from 1981, in 1984 portraits of women working at VEB Treffmodelle, She photographed people in Georgia, Poland and Transylvania, for example young men around the Rome main station.

1983

She photographed houses and faces from Halle from 1983 to 1985, with the approach to document everything like a foreign town in a foreign country (wie eine fremde Stadt in einem fremden Land).

In Halle, she encountered greater difficulty than in Berlin because the people she photographed were strangers who sometimes reacted with hostility.

She then took time to talk to people and ask before photographing them, making them more open to being photographed but still reluctantly, when the streets in the background showed that the city centre looked badly damaged because it was undergoing major and slow redevelopment.

Halle 1983–1985'', planned for the city's Marktschlößchen gallery, was cancelled a few days before the scheduled opening because her pictures gave publicity to the city's misguided building policy.

By the time it was cancelled, a catalogue and exhibition labels for the photographs had already been printed.

Her career as a free-lance photographer survived German reunification, and for some commentators her photographs from the East German period gained a wider interest once the period they depicted had become history.

1986

Her 1986 exhibition ''Houses and Faces.

1996

From 1996, Paris was a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts.

She left her archive of around 230,000 negatives and 6,300 films to the institution.

2003

In 2003, her twelve-part exhibition Self images 1981–1988 in the context of the Art in the German Democratic Republic exhibition drew much interest.