Biała, family portrait, photo by H. Schreinzer. Dimensions: 7 x 11 cm.
Hugo Schreinzer (born in 1851, died in 1920)—the longest-serving photographer, active for over 40 years, and one of the most popular photographers in Biała and Bielsko. Before starting his own business, he managed his brother Robert’s studio in Biała while Robert worked as an itinerant photographer. He opened a studio under his own name in 1878 on Spitalgasse (Schlossgasse 6) in Biała. No later than 1893, he leased the former studio of Albert Thiel on Hauptstrasse an der Brücke (now 11 Listopada Street 11) in Bielsko. In 1898, the Biel studio on Schlossgasse was closed (soon reopened by the new owner, Jakub Gols, under the name “Helios”), and Schreinzer began using business cards with only one address: “Bielitz, Hauptstrasse a. d. Brücke.” Before 1912, a branch of the studio was opened in the photographer’s home at 68 Augasse (now 14 Divine Providence Square). This property was sold in 1918. The studio in Bielsko by the bridge, which was briefly taken over by Ryszard Lüdtke, was closed around 1927. Hugo Schreinzer’s company received awards at exhibitions in Przemyśl in 1880 and in Cieszyn in 1882, as well as at the Industrial Exhibition in Bielsko in 1890. Hugo Schreinzer served as president of the Biała Men’s Choral Society and was also a city councilman in Biała. He is buried in the Catholic cemetery in Biała.
