Walter Ruttmann

Just discovered great German filmmaker - Walter Ruttmann. His first abstract short films, "Opus I" (1921) and "Opus II" (1923), were experiments with new forms of film expression, and the influence of these early abstract films can be seen in 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 form techniques.

Together with Erwin Piscator, Ruttmann worked on the experimental film Melodie der Welt (1929), though he is best remembered for Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt (Berlin: Symphony of a Great City, 1927).

During the Nazi period he worked as an assistant to director Leni Riefenstahl on Triumph of the Will (1935). He died in Berlin.

See also Oskar Fischinger.

Opus II (1924)


Opus III (1924)


Berlin: Symphony of a Great City