Cinémathèque du Rhin supérieur
Kinemathek Oberrhein

Professions : Architect
Lieux de vie : Freiburg i.Br.
Formats : 16 mm
Période d'activité cinéaste : 1928 - 1955
Bobines conservées par MIRA : 28

Curt Balke

Curt Balke was born the son of a master mason in Aschersleben and grew up there. After high school, he worked in the construction business of his father and other companies. He was on study trips to the United States (1902), Switzerland, Italy and the South of France (1910). In order to continue his artistic education, he studied at the Technical University of Stuttgart from 1908-1910 and began to work as an architect. In addition to various private houses, as an enthusiastic gymnast he builz the sports house of the University of Freiburg and in 1914 the sports house of the Turnerbund Freiburg. In 1915 he worked as a reinforcement soldier in the First World War and was involved in the construction, maintenance and operation of the fortifications in the rear. From 1915 to 1918 he worked as an architect and building manager at the Freiburg Municipal Building Authority.

Fichier:Easter 9317 1 c (3) .png

Curt Balke can be seen regularly in his films (LFS)

From 1918 he worked as a freelance architect and in 1919, together with Baurat Wilhelm Sattler, founded the “Freiburg non-profit home building cooperative”, which built the first 100 settlement houses in the 1920s. The aim of the cooperative was "to provide families or people with healthy and functional apartments in purpose-built or purchased houses at reasonable prices." From July 1940 he was involved in the reconstruction of destroyed houses in Breisach, Strasburg and Alsace for the civil engineering department in the civil engineering department Alsace, for which NSDAP Gauleiter Robert Wagner was responsible.

Fichier:Balke Filmschnitt 2 (3) .png

Curt Balke cutting his 16 mm material (LFS)

From around 1930 he made films in 16 mm format. The focus is on his family, his house in Freiburg and, above all, his daughter, whom he accompanies on film from his youth, through marriage, grandchild, to his departure to Chile in 1949. The middle-class family regularly takes trips by car to the southwest, Germany, Alsace, Switzerland, Austria and Italy. These films are unique documents of the places and sights in the 1930 and 1940 years and show everyday situations at that time. In 1911 he joined the "Freiburger Turnerbund". In winter the Balkes are enthusiastic skiers, in summer water sports is captured with the camera. He is often seen in front of the camera himself, so he has to be shot by someone else. He regularly takes pictures of houses he has built. Again and again he makes recordings of historical important events such as the return of German soldiers from the French campaign to Freiburg, the reconstruction in Breisach and Alsace, the destroyed Freiburg at the end of 1944 or the carnival parade through the destroyed Freiburg in 1949. His films document everyday life and that Family life of a bourgeois society in the first half of the 20th century and are invaluable.

Kay Hoffmann