Arnold Newman: Composing Art of Portrait Through Camera

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Arnold Newman Composing Art of Portrait Through
Camera
Renowned American photographer Arnold Newman is
well recognised for his unique approach to
environmental portraiture. March 3, 1918, saw
his birth in New York City, and he died June 6,
2006. By capturing his subjects in their natural
settings and frequently employing dramatic
lighting and composition to portray their
personalities and occupations, Newmans approach
to portraiture transformed the genre. Throughout
his career, Newman took pictures of many famous
people from various areas, including scientists,
writers, singers, politicians, artists, and
writers. His photographs frequently revealed his
subjects inner selves and significance in their
respective disciplines, capturing the soul of the
subjects in a way that went beyond superficial
physical likeness.
Igor Stravinsky, composer. New York,
1946.CreditArnold Newman/Courtesy of Howard
Greenberg Gallery
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Igor Stravinskys piano is depicted in one of
Newmans most well-known pieces, which captures
the essence of the legendary musician in his
creative setting. Newmans reputation as one of
the most significant portrait photographers of
the 20th century has been cemented by the
numerous exhibitions and publications of his
images. When I make a portrait, I dont take a
photograph. I build it. Arnold Newman The
scope of Newmans photographic career is
considered in Building Icons, encompassing his
early experiments, magazine assignments,
creative portraits, corporate work, and reportage
projects. The show also emphasises how vital
periodicals were in helping to mould Newmans
career by fostering his ambition, educating and
inspiring him, and solidifying his reputation.
Examining Newmans interaction with the popular
press broadens our perspective on his creations,
highlights the ingenuity of his technique, and
confirms his indisputable influence on postwar
visual culture. Early Period Through his work
from 1938 to 1945, Newman experimented with
abstract approaches, documentary style, and
portraiture. Drawing from art reviews and images
by various creators, such as the Farm Security
Administration photographers Walker Evans,
Edward Weston, Erwin Blumenfeld, and Berenice
Abbott, he blended his fine art skills with what
he saw in magazines. I began experimenting in
abstraction, abstract realism, and social
realismif one must pigeonhole definitions. I
became fascinated with the control of the camera
and the ability to make it see as I saw. Newman
George Grosz, painter. Bayside, New York,
1942.CreditArnold Newman/Courtesy of Howard
Greenberg Gallery 1938, Newman was employed at
the Philadelphia department store Lit Brothers
photography studio. He took pictures of the
streets of the city during his lunch breaks. In
the studios darkroom, he processed his negatives
during the night.
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I read and looked up everything I could find on
photography, returning to its beginnings and
contemporary workers. My friends produced
material from their libraries and freely gave
their advice and time. My interest burned
strongly within. I went to museums and bought and
clipped magazines like Vanity Fair
Newman The portrait is a biography facts, not
fiction or romanticised visions, must be
documented. Todays magazine contains critical
visual details that will become tomorrows
history textbook. Newman captures his subjects
lived environments in his integrative
portraits, also known as environmental
portraits. Even though the shots seem natural,
Newman deliberately sets up his subjects homes
or places of employment to highlight a particular
facet of their personalities or lines of work.
He would set up elements in the background on the
walls or arrange them in the foreground to
create an atmosphere. Newman developed his
ability to read his subjects through careful
planning for his photo assignments and a keen
sense of how the final photographs would appear
on a magazine page. Photographing his people at
their homes and workplacesstudios, living rooms,
and other natural settingsset Newman apart from
his peers. Because of his methods, Newman was
called the father of the environmental
portrait, but he objected to the title, arguing
that his paintings were more appropriately
described as symbolic. He would build his
images using the hints he discovered in his
subjects spaces by doing prior research on them.
Newman, who had to drop out of school for
financial reasons, had learnt to purposely fumble
around the studio or cubicle until the sitter
relaxed, especially if they were frightened or
reticent. Arnold Newman was a large, rotund,
happy man for most of his professional life. He
had a beard, curly dark hair, and a penchant for
cigars. He loved to tell stories, often on
himself. The stories would later constitute his
lectures about sitters, who were usually quirky
in a very human way. The story of his life was
intertwined with the stories he told. Although
he was called the father of the environmental
portrait, Newman maintained that he was not the
father of something the Dutch painters had done
hundreds of years earlier and that environmental
wasnt the right word. Occasionally, he even
took exception to the word portrait. His grudge
match with these words was a function of his
belief that labels of any kind were restrictive
The minute you put a label on something, there
is no room to move . . . I never thought in
those terms, and I refuse to think in terms
of labels, writes Marianne Fulton in the
book, Arnold Newman At Work.
Carl Sandburg, poet and author, and Marilyn
Monroe, actor. Hollywood, California,
1962.CreditArnold Newman/Courtesy of Howard
Greenberg Gallery
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Family is essential, as Newman has emphasized
throughout his life and career. He developed ties
with the spouses and children of his subjects as
a result of this crucial idea. Unlike other
photographers of the era, Newman often snapped
additional family photos while on duty. Nearby
are two pictures of American painter Andrew
Wyeth one in his studio alone, the other with
his family. Readers could comprehend the
characters personalities and vocations because
of Newmans portraiture method, which involved
posing his subjects in their homes or places of
business while containing their personal
belongings. This approach effectively
illustrated the accompanying text on the magazine
page and the corporate annual report. For More
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