Currently living and working as a freelance-photographer in Hamburg, Knut Gärtner first studied medicine in Freiburg and Lyon, France. He then took up studies of photography at the University of Applied Sciences in Bielefeld and worked as a freelance-assistant for Ivo von Renner, Peter Hamel, Paul Schirnhofer and Christian Schmidt.

As a photographer his clients have been Neon, Stern, Emotion, Woman, Maxi, Allegra, Brigitte, Frankfurter Rundschau, Der Spiegel, Die Zeit.