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Celebration of the Individual Through Photography: Alfred Eisenstaedt, a Pioneering Master Craftsman
| Article
# : |
11717 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
Date : |
4 / 1987 |
1,923 Words |
| Author
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Lloyd Eby
Lloyd Eby has worked in film and video since 1970 and has
published articles on the interaction of film and religion.
With René Berger, he coedited the book Art
and Technology (New York: Paragon House Publishers, 1986).
He is assistant senior editor in the Currents in Modern
Thought
section of The World & I. |
Alfred Eisenstaedt, or "Eisie" as he is now known, has often been called the father of photojournalism. In fact, Eisenstaedt is one of a handful of pioneering photographers who, beginning in Germany shortly after World War I, began producing candid photoreportage. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Germany had more illustrated magazines with greater circulation than any other country. The aggressively imaginative ideas of the editors of these magazines established a style of innovative, unposed candid photography that has now become the norm.
With the ascendancy of Hitler in 1933, however, these magazines folded and most of the editors and photographers left Germany for France, England, and the United States. Eisenstaedt was one who found his way to America where, along with Margaret Bourke-White, Peter Stackpole, and Tom McAvoy, he became one of the original four staff photographers on Henry Luce's new magazine, Life. The first issue of Life appeared in November, 1936, and contained Eisenstaedt's pictures on five of its pages. The second issue had an Eisenstaedt picture on the cover. He has been with Life ever since, up to the time of its demise in 1972, and again since its revival as a monthly in 1978. In those years, he has produced more than ninety Life covers and worked on more than 1,600 assignments.
New Celebrity Status
In the last months of 1986, at least three events came together to bring renewed attention to Eisenstaedt's photographs and career, First, Life magazine published its massive Special Anniversary Issue in is fiftieth year, containing a tribute to Eisie. Second, on November 12, the International Center of Photography
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