In the light of speed
Rainer W. Schlegelmilch is not just a photographer – he is an eyewitness to racing history. Since the early 1960s, he has been capturing with his camera what remains hidden to others: the moment before victory, the concentration under the helmet, the interplay between man and machine under maximum tension. Porsche Racing Moments is his retrospective – not systematic, not without gaps, but with a personal clarity that can only come from being at the centre of the action for years. When you open this book, you enter an archive of speed – full of sounds, smells and faces.
© Taschen Verlag
Porsche as a narrative
What characterises this work is the ability to make the human element visible behind the mechanical spectacle. It is not about horsepower or chassis data, but about what is at stake when people measure their lives against the clock. Schlegelmilch’s pictures don’t just show racing cars, they show moods: the exhausted mechanic, the nervous look before the start, the conversation in the pit lane. Porsche appears here not as a brand, but as an organism – moulded by the people who move it. The technology never takes centre stage on its own, but is part of a larger narrative.
© Taschen Verlag
View from the front row
As a photographer, Rainer W. Schlegelmilch never saw himself as a detached documentarist. He was part of the action – physically and emotionally. This closeness characterises his visual language: unspectacular in the best sense of the word, never sensationalist, always precise. The series on Le Mans, the Nürburgring and the Targa Florio in particular show how he transformed speed into rhythm. His legendary zoom technique intensified this effect – it condensed the race into a gesture. He never lost his respect for risk: many of the drivers he photographed had fatal accidents. This knowledge permeates his images – as a quiet urgency that remains.
© Taschen Verlag
An era in the rear-view mirror
This book is not nostalgic, but it is full of history. You can feel the change: from the improvised pioneering spirit of the sixties to the dominance of the 917s and 962s to the thoroughly professionalised eighties. It is a documented transition – from courage to structure, from chance to planning. But Porsche Racing Moments does not celebrate the past. It is a reminder that passion, risk and dedication are timeless. That motorsport can be more than just marketing. And that photography is strongest when it not only depicts, but also shows attitude.
Data
| Original title | Rainer W. Schlegelmilch – Porsche Racing Moments |
| Author | Rainer W. Schlegelmilch |
| Publisher | Taschen Verlag |
| Cover | Hardcover |
| Pages | 356 |
| Language | English |
| Dimensions | 36 x 30.3 cm |
| ISBN | 978-3-7544-0133-0 |
| Price | 100 € |
Further information
Further information on the book Rainer W. Schlegelmilch – Porsche Racing Moments (Advertising) can be found on the Taschen Verlag website.
Compliance
The book was kindly made available to us by the publisher. The presentation and rating of HYPERMADE remains independent of this and is based solely on the content of the book.
