Gerhard was born and raised in Oberhausen, Germany. He moved to Hamburg when his mother, Ingeborg Bartlewski, remarried. After finishing high school and some college he studied acting in Hamburg. He acted in several plays on stage in Hamburg and took small parts in TV productions.
Extensive travels abroad have allowed Gerhard to study under some of Europe's finest professors and most talented artists. A thorough knowledge and education in the arts of film directing and theater marks his studies and experience in London and Rome. During his stay in Italy, he produced and directed his first film, A la Fine(1986) under his first company, Schwarzfilm Production.
Back in Hamburg under his second company, Lone Star Films GmbH, he directed and produced a variety of TV features, documentary films, and among others an interview with Woody Allen. The short
version of his documentary film on skateboarding, The Contest (1989) (TV) was distributed by Columbia Tri-Star Germany and won the prestigious German
Film Award. Gerhard works and lives since 1996 in Venice, California.
In July 2010 Gerhard had to move back to Hamburg, Germany to take care of his mother. In the following two years he created and wrote a TV crime Show 'Klein & Tracto' and started editing his documentary 'Road Warriors'. Road Warriors is a documentary film on US truckers, their lifestyle on the road and the new generation of true truckers, trying to make a decent living. .Warriors.thefilm . This documentary
needs still another four to five weeks shooting over the course of a
year (for seasonal purpose).
In the winter of 2014 Gerhard started to work on his first book 'One Moore Time - In Another Time'. The book is going to be part his biography, part a philosophical statement on life and part a fiction on what society could be, if certain major events in history had not occurred.
Unique traits: Very visual script writing with no technical terms.
Bundesfilmpreis for The Contest
(1990)