Arnold Newman
Igor Stravinsky, New York City, 1946
Gelatin silver print
''Visual ideas combined with technology combined with personal interpretation equals photography. Each must hold its own: if it doesn't, the thing collapses.''
Arnold Newman (1918-2006) was an American photographer. After studying painting and drawing at the University of Miami for two years, he began his career as a 49-cent portrait photographer in 1938. Moving to New York in 1946, he worked for such magazines as Look and Harper’s Bazaar.
He is most famous for his environmental portraits of artists and celebrities —preferring to photograph his subjects while they were at home or at work, an unusual practice at the time. His work includes portraits of Pablo Picasso, Igor Stravinsky, and Marilyn Monroe. He is also known for his abstract still life images. Newman’s works are held in the numerous prestigious collections including the George East Museum in Rochester, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C.