Rail Magic (subject 569), 1949

Réne Groebli (b. 1927) was born in Zurich, Switzerland. In the 1940s he studied under the noted photographer, Hans Finsler. In 1949 he secured his place among European post-war artists with his iconic portfolio Magic of the Rail. By the early 1950s, Groebli was working as a photographer for Life, Picture Post and other international magazines and participated in the first Subjektive Fototgraphie exhibition in Saarbrüken. In 1955, he was included in the Family of Man exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art. In subsequent years, the artist opened a studio for industrial and advertising photography, and continued his personal work through the present day. In 1999, the Zurich Kunsthaus Art Museum showed a retrospective of his photographs from the years 1946 to 1996. Groebli currently resides in Switzerland.