Although almost forgotten today, Karl August Reinhold Thiele (1856-1921) was regarded as a pioneer in his own lifetime and would advance the field of photography through education, innovation, and invention.

A polymath with a taste for adventure, his pursuit of the field of photography would make him one of the best-travelled people of the age. Using a combination of wagons, trains, steamships, and hot air balloons, he would traverse the globe with a camera and portable darkroom. Capturing visual records of journeys that saw him travelling from the Empire of Korea and the Polynesian Islands to Australia, Mexico, and Europe.

Exploiting innovations in printing technology, he would open one of if not the first press-photography studios in history. Gaining a reputation for his sports reporting and early-adoption of flash photography, he would recieve worldwide recognition for his work in covering the Boer War as the sole ‘officially designated photographer’ of the conflict.

His decades of work helped to pioneer the field of press-photography and shaped the role of photojournalism and its relationship with the Fleet Street press publications, earning him recognition as the Father of Modern Photojournalism.