You’ve probably, at some point in your life seen one of the photographs on this page. They’ve become an facet of Americana, wistful representations of a bygone era in which steam locomotives transported goods and people across the huge expanse of the North American continent. … Keep readingO. Winston Link
Traditional architectural photography is documentary. It’s intended to be aesthetically pleasing, of course, but the primary concern is to accurately depict the appearance of a structure. Most architectural photographers come to their craft through their love of architecture. Robert Polidori is different; he’s different in … Keep readingRobert Polidori
There are artists–painters, dancers, musicians, photographers–for whom you have an immediate affinity. For me, that’s Saul Leiter. He was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1923; his father was a rabbi, a Talmudic scholar of some repute. It was only natural that Saul Leiter would follow … Keep readingSaul Leiter
I recall the first time I saw a photograph by Anders Petersen. It was an image of a bare-chested young man who appears to be blissfully drunk or stoned in the embrace of an older woman who is laughing uproariously. I had no idea the … Keep readingAnders Petersen
He was born to an affluent family in Warsaw in 1911 and given the name Dawid Szymin. His father, Benjamin, was a publisher of books in Hebrew and Yiddish. The family fled Warsaw after the city was bombed at the beginning of the First World … Keep readingDavid Seymour (CHIM)
For the first twenty-nine years of his life, he was pretty unremarkable. He was born in Detroit in 1912, took a degree in engineering from Michigan State, got a steady job in the Motor Parts division of Chrysler Corporation, met a good woman and got … Keep readingHarry Callahan
I’m not an aficionado of landscape photography. I suppose that’s not entirely true. I like to look at landscape photography. I find it visually appealing, but for me the appeal rarely expands beyond the eye. Part of that, I suspect, is because modern visual media … Keep readingOlaf Otto Becker
In 1935, during the Great Depression, the U.S. government tried an experiment. It created the Resettlement Administration, which was intended to relocate poor urban and rural families into planned communities, called ‘green towns.’ The program was intended to create small, planned communities on the outskirts … Keep readingJohn Vachon
She was born Gerta Pohorylle on 1 August, 1910 to a proper upper middle class Jewish family in Stuttgart, Germany. For most of her life, she lived a proper upper middle class life: a good education in Leipzig and at a Swiss boarding school, elegant … Keep readingGerda Taro
Milton Rogovin never intended to be a photographer, let alone one of the most renowned social documentary photographers in the U.S. He was an immigrant’s son who felt privileged to go to college and lucky to obtain a degree that would allow him to enter … Keep readingMilton Rogovin