Collection Online as of December 4, 2023
Igor Stravinsky
Arnold Newman
(American, 1918–2006)
Gelatin silver print
John L. Severance Fund 1992.53
© Arnold Newman
Location
not on view
Description
During his long career, which began in the late 1930s, Newman has consistently been one of the most important practitioners of portraiture. Early on he achieved a vivid, personal style that conveys not only a compelling likeness of the sitter, but also reveals his or her personality using suggestive details in the immediate surroundings. For over 50 years he has recorded public figures, including leading politicians, artists, writers, and musicians. This landmark portrait of Igor Stravinsky, taken soon after Newman moved to New York from Miami, remains one of his best. On assignment for Harper’s Bazaar, Newman took some 26 4-x-5-inch exposures of the artist at his piano. The graphic power of this image, with its striking juxtaposition of man and instrument, firmly establishes Newman’s distinctive, innovative style of portraiture.
Arnold Newman
Arnold Newman American, 1918- Arnold Newman, recognized as one of the foremost portrait photographers of the 20th century, is known especially for developing the "environmental portrait", which places subjects within their own personal spaces, rather than inside the photographer's studio. Initially interested in painting, Newman spent two years studying art at the University of Miami (1936-38) before financial problems led him to take a job in a photographic portrait studio in Philadelphia. He then managed a commercial portrait studio in Florida. Inspired by the social documentary work of the era's Farm Security Administration photographers, Newman began to photograph in the poorer sections of West Palm Beach. In 1941 his photographs and those of his friend Ben Rose were exhibited at the AD gallery in New York City. That same year Newman began making portraits of artists in New York, images that were featured in a one-person show at the Brooklyn Museum (December 1941-January 1942). In 1942 Newman opened his own studio in Miami Beach and continued photographing artists during visits to New York. Three years later the Philadelphia Museum of Art organized a traveling exhibition of these portraits, Artists Look Like This. In 1946 Newman left Florida for New York City, establishing himself as a commercial photographer. He began taking pictures for Harper's Bazaar, Life, and Fortune magazines and by the 1950s was also receiving assignments from Holiday. In the 1950s-60s he continued his portrait series of artists and also photographed such well-known political figures as Dwight Eisenhower, Adlai Stevenson, John F. Kennedy, and Richard Nixon for Life and Holiday. Newman often traveled abroad, producing a number of photo essays for Holiday and other publications. His work has been featured in many exhibitions, including Arnold Newman: Five Decades, organized by the Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego (1986), and Arnold Newman's Americans, at the National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C. (1992), both accompanied by exhibition catalogues. Newman lives in New York. M.M.