Sonya Noskowiak American, b. Germany, 1900-1975 Born in Leipzig and raised in Chile, Sonya Noskowiak moved to California with her family in 1915. While working as a receptionist in the studio of pictorial photographer Johan Hagemeyer in the late 1920s, she met Edward Weston. From 1929-34 Noskowiak worked as Weston's darkroom assistant and studied with him. His work and his advocacy of "straight," unmanipulated photography were strong influences, and in 1932 Noskowiak joined him, Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, Willard Van Dyke, and others to found Group f/64. In the group's first exhibition that year at the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum in San Francisco, Noskowiak exhibited photographs of natural objects (rocks, leaves, and sand) that emphasized their form and texture. Over the following years she concentrated on architectural and industrial subjects and in 1935 opened her own studio in San Francisco, working as a portrait, fashion, and commercial photographer. Noskowiak was active as a photographer until the mid-1960s. In 1978 the Center for Creative Photography, Tucson, organized a retrospective exhibition of her work. M.M.