Andreas Gursky was born in Leipzig in 1955, but grew up in Düsseldorf, the son and grandson of commercial photographers. From 1978 to 1981, he attended Folkwangschule, Essen, where he is said to have studied under Otto Steinert. However, it has been disputed that this can't really be the case, as Steinert died in 1978. Between 1981-1987 at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, Gursky received strong training and influence from his teachers Hilla and Bernd Becher, a photographic team known for their distinctive, dispassionate method of systematically cataloging industrial machinery and architecture. Gursky demonstrates a similarly methodical approach in his own larger-scale photography. Other notable influences are the British landscape photographer John Davies, whose highly detailed high vantage point images had a strong effect on the street level photographs Gursky was then making, and to a lesser degree the American photographer Joel Sternfeld. . Rhein II, an image by Gursky, fetched $4.3m (£2.7m) (€3.3m) at Christie's, New York on November 8, 2011, becoming the most expensive photograph ever sold. ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Gursky