THE TOLSTOY FAMILY ~ A LIFE IN PICTURES
“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” ― Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina Count Lev Tolstoy and his Wife Countess Sophia Tolstoy At Home in Tolstoy’s Study, 1907
photographer
JULES BRASSAI ~ ON THE EXTRAORDINARY
“I don’t invent anything. I imagine everything… most of the time, I have drawn my images from the daily life around me. I think that it is by capturing reality in the humblest, most sincere, most everyday way I can, that I can penetrate to the extraordinary.” Jules Brassai
MAN RAY ~ ON INSPIRATION
“Of course, there will always be those who look only at technique, who ask ‘how’, while others of a more curious nature will ask ‘why’. Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information.” ― Man Ray Photograph is Man Ray in his studio, Paris, 1939.
GEORGE BRASSAI ~ THE NEED OF PASSION
In the absence of a subject with which you are passionately involved, and without the excitement that drives you to grasp it and exhaust it, you may take some beautiful pictures, but not a photographic oeuvre. GEORGE BRASSAI passers-by in the rain , 1935
DORA MAAR ~ THE ULTIMATE MUSE
“Dora Maar in her Studio” Paris, 1946 by Brassai She was born Henriette Theodora Markovitch in Tours, Western France to a Jewish family. Her father, Josip Marković, was a Croat architect, famous for his work in South America; her mother, Julie Voisin, was from Touraine, France. Dora grew up in Argentina. Before meeting Picasso, Maar was already famous as a photographer. She also painted. She met Picasso in January 1936 on the terrace of the Café les Deux Magots in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Paris, when she was 29 years old and...
MAN RAY ~ ON PAINTERS
“To me, a painter, if not the most useful, is the least harmful member of our society.” Man Ray Self portrait with chess set
EDWARD STEICHEN ~ PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE MYSTERIOUS
Anna May Wong, photo taken by Edward Steichen Anna May Wong, 1931 by Edward Steichen Edward Steichen, Self Portrait Edward J. Steichen (March 27, 1879 – March 25, 1973) was an American photographer, painter, and art gallery and museum curator. He was the most frequently featured photographer in Alfred Stieglitz‘ groundbreaking magazine Camera Work during its run from 1903 to 1917. Steichen also contributed the logo design and a custom typeface to the magazine. In partnership with Stieglitz, Steichen opened the “Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession”, which was eventually...
EDWARD STEICHEN ~ PHOTOGRAPHER OF MYSTERY
EDWARD STEICHEN (b Luxembourg, 27 March 1879; d West Redding, CT, 25 March 1973). American photographer, painter, designer and curator of Luxembourgeois birth. Steichen emigrated to the USA in 1881 and grew up in Hancock, MI, and Milwaukee, WI. His formal schooling ended when he was 15, but he developed an interest in art and photography. He used his self-taught photographic skills in design projects undertaken as an apprentice at a Milwaukee lithography firm. The Pool-evening (1899; New York, MOMA) reflects his early awareness of the Impressionists, especially Claude...
LEE MILLER ~ QUOTE
“Other people tend to value you the way you value yourself,” Lee Miller Portrait of Lee Miller ca. 1930
MAN RAY ~ IMAGINATION
“I paint what cannot be photographed, that which comes from the imagination or from dreams, or from an unconscious drive.” Man Ray
