A prolific artist and prodigious printmaker, Janssen was a master etcher but his early woodcuts are also important works. Janssen studied in Hamburg and lived and worked there for most of his life. Many of his prints are self portraits. He also illustrated many books and he had a profound influence on German art of the second half of the 20th century. In a period of about 10 years he drew a series of over 100 portraits of famous literary figures, commissiond by the Buchhandlung Hermann Laatzen, Hamburg.

Right: photograph of Janssen etching