Richard Avedon

Born in 1923 in New York City, Richard Avedon was interested in photography from an early age: he joined the Young Men’s Hebrew Association camera club when he was twelve years old. In 1942, during World War II, he served as Photographer’s Mate Second Class in the US Merchant Marine.

Avedon began working with magazine Harper’s Bazaar at just age 22 and throughout his lifetime creating created portraits of models, actors, celebrities, activists, heads of state, musicians, artists, and writers. While initially on assignment, Avedon was sent out into his New York, photographing models among city life. Throughout his career, he worked with leading publications including Vogue and became the first staff photographer at The New Yorker, where his portraiture helped redefine and expand the aesthetics of the magazine. Avedon’s eye for fashion and portrait photography was instrumental in defining America’s image of style, beauty, and wider culture for decades.

Additionally, Avedon ran a very successful commercial studio in which he developed his very distinct style, a use of a white background, which allowed him to eliminate any unwanted background setting. He focuses on his subjects with a centralised focus, an distinct attention for detail, and static compositions. His studio gave him the space to develop his particular style, as well as the freedom to pursue personal and political passions. Beyond fashion, he is renowned for his documentation of the Vietnam war, an intimate cycle of photographs of his father, portraits of the American power elite, and his magnum opus In the American West depicting everyday working Americans across the country. 

More than any other photographer he successfully worked to erase the distinction between photography and fine art, with early solo museum shows at The Smithsonian (1962) and the Minneapolis Institute of Fine Art (1970). In 1978, he became the first living photographer to be awarded a solo show at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. He had a second retrospective show there in 2002. 

His work has melded with literature, publishing books throughout his life, Observations, with an essay by Truman Capote, was published in 1959. He continued to publish books of his works throughout his life, including Nothing Personal in 1964 (with an essay by James Baldwin), Portraits 1947–1977 (1978, with an essay by Harold Rosenberg), An Autobiography (1993), Evidence 1944–1994 (1994, with essays by Jane Livingston and Adam Gopnik), and The Sixties (1999, with interviews by Doon Arbus).