Thursday, March 13

Chapter 9 Notes

KEY WORDS/PEOPLE
*Alvin Langdon Coburn- (1882-1966) Fine Art Photographer. He began taking photographs at the age of eight, became a founder-member of Photo-Secession and in 1903 was elected to the Linked Ring, and at the early age of twenty-five had exhibited a one-man show at the Royal Photographic Society. Coburn made a number of urban landscape pictures, with a definite mood. He was also an accomplished portrait photographer, and in 1913 and 1922 produced a two-volume collection of photographs of celebrities, entitled "Men of Mark." He is perhaps best known for producing Vortographs, non-objective photographs of such items as a piece of wood or crystal, through an arrangement of mirrors, resulting in multiple images.

*Edward Steichen (1879–1973) was an American photographer, painter, and art gallery and museum curator, born in Luxembourg. Having established himself as a fine art painter in the beginning of the 20th century, Steichen assumed the pictorialist approach in photography and proved himself a master of it. In 1905, Steichen helped create the Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession with Alfred Stieglitz. After World War I, during which he commanded the photographic division of the American Expeditionary Forces, he reverted to straight photography, gradually moving into fashion photography. Steichen's 1928 photo of actress Greta Garbo is recognized as one of the definitive portraits of Garbo. During World War II, he served as Director of the Naval Photographic Institute. His war documentary The Fighting Lady won the 1945 Academy Award for Best Documentary.

*Imogen Cunningham (1883 - 1976) was an American Fine Art photographer known for her photography of botanicals, nudes and industry. Cunningham became one of the co-founders of the Group f/64. In the 1940s Cunningham turned to documentary street photography which she did as a side project whilst supporting herself with her commercial and studio photography and later on with teaching at the California School of Fine Arts.

*Paul Strand (1890 –1976) was an American photographer and filmmaker who, along with fellow modernist photographers like Alfred Stieglitz and Edward Weston, helped establish photography as an art form in the 20th century. Some of this early work experimented with formal abstractions, while other works showed his interest in using the camera as a tool for social reform. Although Strand is best known for his early abstractions, his return to still photography in this later period produced some of his most significant work in the form of six book ‘portraits’ of place.