Frank Simon Hofmann

František Simon Hofmann (27 December 1916 in Prague, Austria-Hungary^[1] – 13 April 1989 in Auckland, New Zealand), widely known as Frank Simon Hofmann was a Czech photographer who was recognised for his art in both Europe and New Zealand.

Hofmann was born in Prague, the son of a prosperous Jewish businessman. He was givern his first camera by his mother at 13 to use on a trip to Venice, and at 16 joined the Prague Photographic Society.^[1]

In 1940, Hofmann fled to England to escape persecution during the Nazi German occupation of Prague.^[1] He arrived in New Zealand in 1940,^[2] first joining cousins in Christchurch, where he began working as a freelance photographer.^[1] He moved around the country searching for more permanent employment; first to Wellington, followed by Napier and eventually to Auckland.^[1]

In Auckland, Hofmann became deeply involved in Auckland's cultural scene: friends with artist Dennis Knight Turner, writer Frank Sargeson, violinist Maurice Clare, and architect Vernon Brown.^{[citation needed]} Hofmann began working with Clifton Firth,^[2][3] and became a foundation member of the Auckland String Players (later who developed into the Symphonia of Auckland), where he played violin and later served as the management chairman).^[1]

In 1947, Hofmann joined Colonial Portraits as their manager of photographic production. There he met Bill Doherty, with whom he established Christopher Bede Studios, a commercial photography studio, in the early 1950s.^[2][1]

Hofmann's first solo show didn't come until 1959, an exhibition at the Photographic Society of New Zealand's Tauranga convention. There was a revival of interest in Hofmann and his work in the late 1980s as a retro icon of New Zealand modernist taste. A 1987 retrospective was mounted at Auckland's Aberhart North Gallery. In 1989 his work featured in a nationally touring show mounted by what was then the National Art Gallery, Object & Style: Photographs from Four Decades 1930s–1960s, and again in 1992 in the Auckland Art Gallery's The 1950s Show.^[4]

Hofmann died in Auckland on 13 April 1989.^[1]

Hofmann married editor and poet Helen Lilian Shaw in Auckland on 24 December 1941. Together they had two sons.^[1]

During his time at the Prague Photographic Society, he acquired a knack of both Romantic Pictorialism and modernist New Objectivity.^{[citation needed]} Hofmann is widely seen as one of the leading figures of New Photography, which influenced the contemporary photography movement in New Zealand.^[2] His photographs were typically of urban landscapes.^[2]