Arnold Newman: Biography and Creativity

Since the XIX century photography gradually and firmly entered our life. The cameras of modern devices are so compact that they are built into ordinary mobile phones, and anyone can get used to art to some extent. Most images do not require any special skills or equipment, such images are suitable for instant information exchange in the global network.

There are many professionals among photographers, there are several special techniques to make a high-quality picture, having mastered them, you can shoot great photos. However, there are world-famous masterpieces of art photography of recognized masters, one of which I would like to mention in more detail.

Regalia of the Master

Arnold Abner Newman from those people for whom photography has become not just a professional field for life, but a way of creative self-realization. During his lifetime, Newman was universally recognized as a portrait master, creator of his own style of shooting an object in a suitable setting. In 1996, on the basis of the CBS channel, a film was made about Arnold Newman's contribution to world culture.

The photographer was awarded numerous awards and titles, including nine honorary doctoral degrees in the field of arts and humanities. Various large communities of photographers and journalists, as well as art museums, have repeatedly celebrated Newman's merits with awards and awards. Arnold Newman, whose works still impress many people, left behind a great legacy, among which portraits of famous people are especially well known. Thanks to his photos and we can now plunge into the atmosphere of the last century.

Arnold Newman, biography: the beginning

Born Newman March 3, 1918 in New York, later, along with his parents moved to New Jersey and then to Philadelphia. He showed artistic talent since childhood and went to study at the University of Miami after school. The Great Depression left its imprint on many of the fates of that time, and Newman was unable to complete his studies.

In 1938 he had to get a job in a portrait photo studio, which determined his career for a lifetime. The shooting, he said, was more like a conveyor belt, but she taught him how to work with people. The hobby for painting in his youth was not in vain, and by 1941 Arnold Newman was able to shoot quite interesting photographs to impress the curator of the Museum of Modern Art of Newhall and the photographer Stieglitz. Participation in the exhibition from the submission of these people brought Arnold Newman first fame.

The key to the image of Stravinsky

In 1945, Arnold Newman organized his own exhibition called "That's how artists look" in the Museum of Art in Philadelphia. For more than a dozen years he experimented with portraits of people in their respective inner world surroundings, and his vision of the images of contemporary famous artists enjoyed considerable success with the public. The photographer started to buy well-known publications, the covers of leading magazines were decorated with the works of the beginning master-portrait painter.

In the following year, 1946, Newman received an order for one of the most significant works for him - a portrait of Stravinsky, a famous composer of the time. In his work with Igor Stravinsky he relied on the simplicity and accuracy of the display of all elements of the composition, thus creating a symbolic portrait of the composer. Stravinsky was fascinated by the work of the photographer, sometimes stating that it was Newman who owed his popularity. Later, in 1967, Arnold Newman released a book-album "Bravo, Stravinsky", which became one of his first serious publications.

Games with light

Simultaneously, in 1946, the photographer moved to New York and created his studio, his affairs went uphill. Arnold Newman, whose photos have already made his name, began to shoot famous politicians and artists. Among them were actors, musicians, industrialists and public figures. They agreed to pose precisely in the concept that Newman conceived. Arnold, brought up in painting, always considered the surrounding of the portrait object to be no less important in the overall picture of the picture than the expression of a person or pose.

It was with the help of background details and additional objects that Newman tried to reflect the place of the person portrayed in the world, the features of his activity and nature. At the same time, Newman rarely interfered with the environment surrounding the subject, he preferred to work with natural light. In this regard, he most often used 35-mm SLR cameras with one lens, which allowed maximum use of lighting on site, without the use of studio equipment.

Family and work, together for life

Arnold Newman in 1949 married Augusta Rubenstein, the girl of her circle. Their marriage brought them two sons in 1950 and 1952. The photographer died on June 6, 2006, from cardiac arrest. By that time Newman was already a recognized master of photography. 7 years before his death, the photographer collected his best works in a large exposition and exhibited them under the general title "Arnold Newman's Gift: 60 Years of Photographs."

The exhibition is still exhibited in the United States of America to the delight of connoisseurs of artistic photography. Newman did not stop working until his death, as he claimed in 2002, he and his wife are "very busy." He worked on new books, embodied new ideas, engaged in new experiments as if he did not intend to stop at all.

Enviromental portraiture

Newman is considered the creator of a special direction in portrait photography, the so-called portrait in a natural environment. He combined the characteristic features of a documentary photo with the artistic style of photography in the studio. The photographer himself was always against the big names, considering the main thing in his work is to take photos of people in such a way that good shots are obtained.

That is, the main thing for Newman was not the creation of an external entourage for a beautiful background or the special preparation of the model, his facial expressions and the correct posture. The photographer should work here and now, guessing the moment for shooting in a familiar setting. That's how he worked with Marilyn Monroe, filming the actress during a meeting with Karl Sandberg. The right moment was also chosen when creating a sensational portrait of Alfred Krupp, an industrial German tycoon.

In each work of the master, the feelings and experiences of the object are seen, and the environment, as it were, emphasizes, directs the general thought, speaks of the material applications of man's aspirations. Newman always insisted that a portrait as good as a biography could tell about people.