Wim Wenders  (German, 1945) 

Wim Wenders (German, b.1945) was born in Düsseldorf, Germany. Wenders became interested in film while working as an engraver for Johnny Friedlaender (German, 1912–1992) in France. He moved back to Germany and began working for United Artists, and then enrolled at the Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film in Munich from 1967 to 1970.

Wenders was a prominent figure at the end of the New German Cinema period of the 1960s. As a filmmaker, he is most noted for films such as Paris, Texas, for which he won the Palm D’Or at Cannes in 1984, and Wings of Desire, for which he won Best Director at Cannes in 1987. In addition to his narrative films, Wenders has had success in documentary film making as well, with films such as Buena Vista Social Club (1999).

Wenders has also exhibited photographs since the 1980s. These works come from his travels and his location-scouting for films. He has had his work shown at many galleries and museums throughout his career. Between 1986 and 1992, his show, Written in the West, toured throughout Europe and Miami. The show included a collection of photography from his time location-scouting for Paris, Texas in 1983. Wim Wenders Photographs, a collection of his personal photographs, was exhibited around the world from 1989 to 1994. He then exhibited Landscape and Memory at the Gallery of Contemporary Photography in Santa Monica in 1996.

Other exhibitions of his photography include Once, which was exhibited from 1993 to 1995, and a retrospective of his landscape photography called Pictures from the Surface of the Earth, which was exhibited from 2002 to 2004 at major museums such as the Guggenheim. Recently, Wenders made Pina, a 3-D movie about the work of choreographer Pina Bausch. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA, and Berlin, Germany.