Photographer Roman Vishniac is widely known and admired for his iconic images of pre-World War II life in Eastern Europe, a world that vanished due to the Holocaust. He was also a pioneer of microphotography, a technique that combines photography and microscopy to reveal the smallest aspects of nature in vivo and living color.

Vishniac was always observing the world around him. Now, a new documentary film turns the lens back at him and sheds light on who he was not only professionally, but also as a person.

American-Israeli filmmaker Laura Bialis does this in “Vishniac” by artfully tracing the arc of the photographer’s life from the perspective of his daughter Mara Vishniac Kohn.

“Mara was such an amazing person. And she was a captivating storyteller. She had this incredible gift of remembering things through a child’s eyes — what everything felt like and what those experiences were like. She never lost that connection to her childhood viewpoint,” Bialis said in an interview with The Times of Israel.

The film, which premiered in February at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival and will screen at the Docaviv International Documentary Film Festival beginning May 11, is as much about Kohn’s sometimes fraught relationship with her talented and idiosyncratic father as it is about Vishniac’s biography.

“He regarded himself as a mixture of Moses and Superman,” Kohn said of her father, who tended toward self-aggrandizement.

Later in life, Vishniac claimed he had an incredible number of doctorates and spoke eight languages. One television program on his microphotography referred to him as a scientist and philosopher. Another called him an expert on Oriental art and a collector of medieval manuscripts. A consummate storyteller, it was hard to detect whether there was a kernel of truth hidden within all these embellishments.

Mara Vishniac Kohn as she appears in ‘Vishniac’ by filmmaker Laura Bialis. (Courtesy of Laura Bialis)

In “Vishniac,” Bialis seamlessly weaves together many of Vishniac’s 30,000 images (mainly still, but also some moving), his writings, general archival footage, interviews with historians and Vishniac relatives, and dramatic reenactments filmed on location in Poland and at a California studio. (Bialis’s daughter impressively plays Mara Vishniac Kohn in these scenes.)

At the heart of it all are Kohn’s memories and narration.

Always looking through the camera or microscope

Photographer Roman Vishniac (© Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, University of California, Berkeley)

Roman Vishniac (1897–1990) was born near St. Petersburg, Russia, and grew up in Moscow. His successful businessman father, Solomon Vishniac, had a special permit to live in the major city instead of in the Pale of Settlement with most other Jews.

Fascinated with cameras and microscopes from a young age, Vishniac always wanted to be a scientist and studied biology at university. However, his academic pursuits were curtailed by the Russian Revolution, at which time his bourgeois family escaped to Berlin.

The culturally and socially free Weimar Republic served as fertile ground for Vishniac’s visual creativity. Uninterested in following his father and grandfather into business, he insisted on doing nothing but his photography and micrography. He, his wife Luta, son Wolf (born 1922), and daughter Mara (born 1926) were supported by Vishniac’s parents.

Filmmaker Bialis recreates moving scenes in which Vishniac includes young Wolf and Mara on his nature walks or in his activities in his home lab filled with cages and aquariums for everything from monkeys to lizards.

“He was always calling me to see the beautiful things that he saw,” Vishniac Kohn recounted.

“He would tell me that the closer you come, the more beautiful it is,” she added.

She especially loved spending time in the darkroom with her father, watching images emerge, the dark areas first.

Despite these happy memories, Kohn speaks in the film about the uncomfortable tension between her parents, who had drifted apart. She recalled her mother, brother, and herself being a unit living a regular life, while her father was immersed in his own world. In addition, Vishniac began a long-term extramarital relationship with a young non-Jewish woman named Edith in 1932.

Making it out of Europe in the nick of time

What would come next in the Vishniac family’s story is what initially sparked Bialis’s interest in eventually making her documentary. In 1996, Bialis met Kohn at a lecture given by Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel in Santa Barbara, California.

“Mara and I both lived in Santa Barbara, so it wasn’t surprising that we eventually met. The Jewish community there is quite small,” Bialis said.

The two women were seated next to each other, and before the lecture started, Kohn told Bialis about how her family escaped Europe to safety in New York at the very last moment.

Photo of Mara Vishniac Kohn and her older brother Wolf Vishniac as teenagers. (© Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, University of California, Berkeley)

Roman and Luta Vishniac divorced in 1935 but did not file the papers in hopes of getting a family visa to exit Nazi Germany. Following the Kristallnacht pogrom in November 1938, the Vishniacs sent 16-year-old Wolf to relatives in Riga, Latvia, and Mara, 12, to a refugee children’s home in Sweden. Mara eventually reunited with her mother in Stockholm, but Roman, who had made it to the south of France, ended up in an internment camp in September 1939.

Since all four family members were Latvian rather than German citizens through Luta’s birth in Riga, Luta was able to get the Latvian authorities to arrange for Vishniac’s eventual release. With the US still accepting Latvians (but not German Jews), they were able to get visas. Luta and the children had to risk traveling back through Berlin to make their way to Lisbon, Portugal. They met Roman there, and together they boarded a ship that arrived in New York on December 1, 1940.

“I was sitting at the edge of my seat as she told me this amazing story,” Bialis said.

Circumstances dictate photographic subject and style

Photo of a young Mara Vishniac Kohn taken by her father Roman Vishniac in pre-World War II Berlin. Vishniac would place his daughter in front of Nazi propaganda so he could photograph it unquestioned. (© Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, University of California, Berkeley)

In tracing Vishniac’s development as a photographer, Bialis includes in the film his early Russian pictorial style work and his Weimar-era modernist images featuring strong angles, sharp contrasts, and geometry.

As the Nazis rose to power and imposed anti-Jewish race laws, Vishniac would photograph his young daughter Mara standing in front of posters and other types of propaganda. It was a way of documenting what was happening without drawing attention.

Once the Nazi regime banned most Jews from their jobs, Vishniac documented the Jewish institutions established to employ Jewish professionals and care for the community. These included schools, hospitals, soup kitchens, and hachsharot (agricultural programs to prepare young Jews for immigration to Palestine).

At the same time, he began traveling to Eastern Europe to capture life in the big cities, towns, and small shtetls. He even reached remote Jewish farming communities in the Carpathian mountains.

Those trips, eventually commissioned by the American Joint Distribution Committee, produced not only stunning images but also documentation of the poverty of Eastern European Jews. For Vishniac, they were a means of advocating for his fellow Jews, and for the AJDC they were a tool for fundraising for relief for those same people.

Photo of a Jewish farmer in Vysni Apsa in the Carpathian mountains taken by Roman Vishniac pre-World War II (© Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, University of California, Berkeley)

Although these photos were an assimilated Western European Jew’s perspective on the Ostjuden, they provided Vishniac with an opportunity to grow closer to his own Jewish identity.

“He felt a close relationship to the people he was photographing,” Kohn said.

Bialis noted that Vishniac’s modernist photographs showed his striving to be part of the mainstream. His work in Eastern Europe denoted a clear shift toward particularism and an appreciation for the spiritual and traditional Jewish life.

“As we were going through his photographs and his writings, we could kind of see him falling in love with his own people,” she said.

During the war, Vishniac held three exhibitions of these photos to raise consciousness for the plight of European Jewry. And after the war, the AJDC sponsored him to return to Europe to document the destruction and the hundreds of thousands of Jewish displaced persons. (Already divorced from Luta, he reunited with and married Edith in Germany and brought her to the US).

Carving out a niche with microphotography

Once in America, Vishniac had to hustle to support his family. He shot portraits and managed to get some magazine work. He even brought his young teenage daughter along as he showed up unannounced at Albert Einstein’s office at Princeton University. He convinced Einstein to let him take some pictures of him.

“He had enormous chutzpah,” Kohn said.

Bialis said she got to see those images a couple of decades before beginning work on “Vishniac.” It was when she and her parents were visiting Kohn at her home not long after Bialis initially met her. At the time, all of Vishniac’s photos, negatives, journals, and other materials were stored at Kohn’s home, where she lived with her second husband Walter Kohn, an Austrian Jewish refugee and Nobel Prize-winning theoretical chemist and physicist.

“She opened the closet where a lot of the stuff was, and this portfolio of Einstein just fell out,” Bialis recalled.

Microphotography by Roman Vishniac. (© Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, University of California, Berkeley)

Wanting to make the cover of LIFE magazine, Vishniac concentrated on his microphotography and a technique called colorization that he claimed to have invented. His insistence on observing things in vivo and motion, rather than squashed between two pieces of glass on a slide, was considered his legitimate contribution to science and helped him secure a major grant from the National Science Foundation to create the widely viewed “Living Biology” film series.

Vishniac lectured widely and thought of himself as a true scientist. However, the scientific community thought otherwise, seeing him merely as a photographer and romantic storyteller. He had a habit of describing nature as a narrative, rather than as facts and data.

Even Vishniac’s own son Wolf, who became a renowned microbiologist, was uncomfortable with his claims and theories. (Wolf died tragically in 1973 at age 51 from a fall from a cliff while on a scientific expedition in Antarctica.)

Choosing among tens of thousands of images

Bialis, who became close to Kohn over the years she interviewed her for the film, was given full access to the Vishniac Archive at The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at the University of California, Berkeley. Before 2018, the archive was curated by Maya Benton and housed at the International Center of Photography (ICP) in New York.

Most of Vishniac’s scientific photography is housed at the Moving Image Research Collections at the University of South Carolina. Kohn also gave Bialis access to that.

Faced with an abundance of riches, it was difficult for Bialis to choose which images to include in “Vishniac.”

‘Vishniac’ filmmaker Laura Bialis (Sharon Derhy)

“His photos are all stunning. It was amazing to have access to every single frame that he shot and to be able to choose. It is mind-blowing how amazing they are, especially in terms of the way he captured the faces of people. And I feel like there’s some sort of magical connection that he had with his subjects, the way they’re looking at him. He sort of was able to capture someone’s essence,” she said.

Kohn died in 2018 at age 92 and did not live to see the completion of the film. Bialis said that was very difficult, but that she was pleased by the response of Kohn’s daughter and granddaughters. They were thankful that the film gave Kohn — a compelling and accomplished person in her own right — a chance to come out from the shadow of the successful and famous men in her life.

“Mara’s daughter spoke at the film’s premiere and said that it was the story that her mother wanted to tell. That made me feel great,” Bialis said.

… there are times when just looking at a photo puts you into a mood or state that evokes strong memories of good times past and likely future and such was the case with the image of the three Cinnamon Teal in flight above … the times in duck blinds before dawn, the decoys set, mist blanketing the water and surrounding trees and a cup of strong black coffee in a tin mug keeping hands warm … or the early morning days on the lake looking for birds as the world slowly wakes from the night … pick your own memories and envision what you will … put yourself there!

Below is a photo looking through a gateway into one of the formal gardens at Filoli Gardens and it appears that Katie decided to transport out and join me as she waits for me to pass through the gateway … perhaps another dimension …

Past time to wrap the day … have a beautiful day and look for a little beauty today … in nature and in the people you meet and greet … above all, smile, you are here and how terrific is that!

Cheers,

Ted

I am the dawn, the whisper of winds, the perfume
of morning.

The passing night fondled me, hovering close to me,
softly, silently.

The breaking day builds the spirit temple of my joy.
I abandon myself!

It seems to me that never before have I walked with
the spirit as now, nor overcome space, time, and the
elements as I overcome them now.

I see all as one, and nothing repels me, as this new
day climbs noiselessly out of the alley of the night.

Peace lies over the world and over the world of my soul.

excerpts from On A May Morning by Max Ehrmann

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The easiest way to reach Mr. Grussing is by email: ted@tedgrussing.com

In addition to sales of photographs already taken Ted does special shoots for patrons on request and also does air-to-air photography for those who want photographs of their airplanes in flight. All special photographic sessions are billed on an hourly basis.

Ted also does one-on-one workshops for those interested in learning the techniques he uses.  By special arrangement Ted will do one-on-one aerial photography workshops which will include actual photo sessions in the air.

More about Ted Grussing …

The influential prize, in partnership with the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation, rewards artists and their projects recognised as having made the most significant contribution to international contemporary photography over the past 12 months.

The exhibition showcasing all four shortlisted artists is on show at The Photographers’ Gallery until 11 June 2023.

Samuel Fosso was awarded the Prize for his exhibition Samuel Fosso at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris, (10 November 2021 – 13 March 2022). 
 

Since the mid-1970s, Samuel Fosso (b. 1962, Kumba, Cameroon) has dedicated his artistic practice to self-portraits and performative photography. Fosso’s retrospective exhibition traces a career of almost 50 years, bringing together iconic series, lesser known works, archival material and previously unpublished images. Raised in Nigeria, Fosso fled the Biafran War as a young boy, and in 1972 was taken in by an uncle in Bangui in the Central African Republic. In 1975, at the age of thirteen, Fosso opened his Studio Photo Nationale. Alongside commercial work, Fosso immediately began a series of self-portraits – a mode of representation he has never abandoned. Described as ‘a man of 1000 faces’, Fosso plays the role of leading historical figures, including Martin Luther King, Angela Davis and Haile Selassie, and social archetypes in front of the camera, embodying a powerful way of existing in the world, and a vivid demonstration of photography’s role in the construction of myths. His work is also deeply personal, he said ‘making pictures of myself later in life was a way for me to take back what I had been lacking as a child, to take back my reflection.’
 

Wildlife photographer Deepak Shankar will display 50 to 60 of his best works in a solo exhibition titled ‘Into the Wild’ in Bengaluru next week.

“While most exhibits will be 36 x 24 inches in size, copies will be available for purchase in different sizes,” informs Shankar, who stays in Jayanagar.

The four-day show will feature photographs of big cats, elephants and birds from Africa and India. ‘The Flying Hunt’, a sequence of photos that captures a cheetah chasing an impala, will also be up for viewing. It earned him a runner-up spot in the 2019 wildlife photo competition ‘The Greatest Maasai Mara Photographer of the Year’.

Although he has shown most of these works on various tours and his Instagram handle (@deepak.shankar.photography), he is mounting a solo exhibition for the first time. Going
forward, he plans to hold one exhibition every year.

Shankar started out as a photographer in 2008 and decided to specialise in wildlife photography six years later. A trip to the Yala National Park in Sri Lanka was the turning point. “All the hard work you put in amounts to maybe one memorable shot or two,” the 39-year-old says.

The love for wildlife started young. The Nature Club in his school, Sri Kumaran Children’s Home in Doddakallasandra, used to host excursions and nature-related activities, he recalls. As a tribute to his school, the exhibition will be inaugurated on May 18 by Deepa Sridhar, director of academics of Sri Kumaran Group of Educational Institutions.

His passion for wildlife photography has given way to advocacy for wildlife conservation. A lot of his shots feature predators or large herbivores gazing at the camera. “This helps to establish a connection with the viewer. I want the future generations to see the wild in its pristine state rather than go to the zoo, which is a commercial site for conservation,” he explains.

Shankar hopes to show “the beauty and intrigue of the natural wild” through this exhibition. He will be present at the venue to discuss his work, take questions and talk about his career with aspiring photographers.

From May 18 to 21, 10 am to 7 pm, at Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath, Kumarakrupa Road. Entry free. For details, visit deepakshankar.in

One of Africa’s most important living photographers and contemporary artists, who photographs himself in the style of leading historical figures including Martin Luther King and Angela Davis, has won the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation prize 2023.

The Cameroonian-born Nigerian photographer Samuel Fosso was awarded the £30,000 prize – one of the most prestigious in the industry – at the Photographers’ Gallery in London on Thursday.

The award was in recognition of Fosso’s retrospective exhibition, Samuel Fosso, at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie in Paris, which traced a career spanning almost 50 years.

Shoair Mavlian, the director of the Photographers’ Gallery and chair of the Deutsche Börse jury, praised Fosso’s work for creating “an extraordinary platform for Black voices and artists throughout his career”.

Mavlian said Fosso’s sustained exploration of self-portraiture “uses a traditional, studio-based approach steeped in history, while at the same time his work remains relevant and addresses contemporary political issues of today with humour and authenticity”.

Raised in Nigeria, Fosso fled the Biafran war as a young boy, and in 1972 was taken in by an uncle in Bangui in the Central African Republic. In 1975, at the age of only 13, he opened his Studio Photo Nationale to take commercial portrait photographs. Initially, he made self-portraits to fill the unused parts of his photographic films but it became a mode of representation the artist has never abandoned.

“I started taking self-portraits simply to use up spare film; people wanted their photographs the next day, even if the roll wasn’t finished, and I didn’t like waste. The idea was to send some pictures to my mother in Nigeria, to show her I was all right,” he has previously told the Guardian.

“Then I saw the possibilities. I started trying different costumes, poses, backdrops. It began as a way of seeing myself grow up, and slowly it became a personal history – as well as art, I suppose. In 1994, there was an exhibition of African photography in Mali. I looked out some of my self-portraits, and won first prize. Now my work has been exhibited in Paris, New York, London.”

Described as “a man of 1,000 faces”, Fosso plays the role of leading historical figures in front of the camera, which also includes Mao Zedong, Malcolm X and Patrice Lumumba, demonstrating photography’s role in the construction of myths.

Anne-Marie Beckmann, the director of the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation, said Fosso’s retrospective “opened up new perspectives, allowing many more people to discover his work for the first time; and thrilled and surprised those who felt they already knew it”.

“Through the retrospective we were able to see his work differently and gain a much deeper understanding of the relevance of his practice today,” she said.

The jury also acknowledged the work of the other shortlisted artists – Bieke Depoorter, Arthur Jafa and Frida Orupabo, who received £5,000 each.

The exhibition showcasing all four artists is at the Photographers’ Gallery until 11 June.