Arnold Newman started his career as a photographer during the 1940s. The artist quickly established himself as a leader in the industry. He became known for his ability to thoughtfully capture the personalities of his subjects through their expressions and surroundings. Because of his use of deep focus in order to create a sense of context around his subjects, Newman became known as an environmental portraitist in his career. Continue reading to explore his photographic style and see some of his most iconic works.

Arnold Newman was a pioneering portrait photographer. He is remembered for his innovative, enlightening, and expressive images that show some of the most famous figures of the 20th century.  Born in New York City in 1918, the portraitist began his career as a photographer in the 1940s. He studied under the influential artist Berenice Abbott, who was known for her incredible portraits and photographs of architecture and urban design in New York City. Newman worked as a commercial photographer for various publications over the following years, including the New Yorker, Life, Vanity Fair, Harper’s Bazaar, Esquire, and New York Times Magazine.

Over the course of his long career, Newman became known for his distinctive approach to portraiture photography, which often involved placing his subjects within a particular context that would show their job or their surroundings. He didn’t just ask for his subjects to simply pose for him in a generic studio setting. With his masterful use of the background which was supposed to help tell an insightful story, Newman came to be known as an environmental portraitist. This was a tribute to the fact that the environment served as such an important part of his photographic works. However, the portraitist did not quite agree with the nickname he was given. He didn’t care for this title, so he never adopted it himself. The artist simply did what felt natural to him, showing his subjects in their natural setting. With his continuous exploration of the art of portrait photography, Newman truly became a pioneer in this field.

Despite working with his subjects in their natural habitat in a way that seems effortless and candid the artist was known for masterfully conceptualizing his projects in detail, designing floor plans, equipment, schedules, and possible poses before the actual shoot even took place. For many of his projects, the artist took the time to set up the composition well before the subject was placed in it. This highlights just how much he valued the importance of photographic interaction between the subject and the background in an image.

Newman had the chance to photograph some of the most famous figures of the 20th century. He portrayed artists, intellectuals, political figures, and celebrities. All of his photographs of these various individuals capture the unique qualities that made each of them so important in their respective fields. Some of the famous figures he portrayed include John F. Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Albert Einstein, Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali, and Elvis Presley. Let’s take a look at some examples of these works.

Arnold Newman’s Portraits of Famous People

During his time as an artist, Arnold Newman made several incredible portraits of Pablo Picasso, the Spanish painter, and sculptor regarded as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. In 1954 Newman however strayed from his usual use of background and focused directly on Picasso himself. Specifically, he focused on the details of Picasso’s face and his expression. In this portrait, Picasso looks directly at the camera with a hand resting on his forehead, looking more serious than in many other photographs of him.

In another instance in 1956, Newman captured Picasso in his studio where he was surrounded by paintings and sculptures. The photograph conveys a sense of the intensity, passion, and obsession that drove Picasso to create his body of work. The image also serves as an incredible testament to Newman’s ability to capture the essence of his subjects through the objects that surround them.

In the shot, Picasso is shown seated on a chair in a large room filled with both finished and unfinished artworks. The artist is dressed in casual attire. He seems to have his house slippers on while sitting backward on the chair in an informal way. The photograph shows us the ordinary Pablo Picasso. The portrait of Picasso in his studio is an example of Newman’s signature style. The photograph captures Picasso as an artistic genius in his natural environment. Newman’s portrait of Picasso is a memorable image that has become an iconic representation of the artist and his legacy.

Another one of Newman’s famous portraits is that of Alfried Krupp, a German industrialist and head of the Krupp family business. This photo is especially striking and noteworthy given that the Krupp business supplied Nazi Germany with warfare for years, many of which were manufactured using slave labor. Newman was a Jewish man himself, so this unsettling photo of Krupp becomes one of Newman’s most striking portraits on which he later commented by saying: It was my impression of a Nazi who managed to survive yet killed millions of people.

The portrait was taken in 1963 and shows Krupp seated at his desk in the Krupp family factory in Essen, Germany. The man is shown with a serious expression on his face, his hands folded in front of him while he gazes directly at the camera. The photograph is notable for its use of chiaroscuro lighting, with parts of Krupp’s face and hands well-lit while the rest of his face, along with the eerie factory in the back, is in the shadows. The image shows him in an evil-looking light as a reminder of the monstrosities created by the Nazis. Needless to say, Krupp, who was hesitant to have his photo taken by a Jewish man in the first place, was not happy with his portrait. Newman, on the other hand, commented that taking such a portrait was his own little moment of revenge.

Arnold Newman’s most iconic works show his various portraits of the 35th President of the United States John F. Kennedy. Newman’s intimate and insightful photographs of Kennedy are considered some of the most striking and memorable images of the President. Newman’s photographs showed him in various locations, the White House included.

Taken both shortly before and after Kennedy’s inauguration in 1961, the photos capture the youthful energy and charismatic personality that Kennedy was known for. Newman’s ability to capture the essence of his subject through his candid expressions and surroundings, combined with his skillful use of the camera, makes his portraits of Kennedy some of the most iconic and enduring images of the 20th century.

Newman also took photos of Marilyn Monroe, one of the most celebrated actresses of all time. Newman’s photograph of Monroe and Carl Sandburg is a famous image taken in 1951. The photograph shows Monroe sitting on a couch with her head tilted to the side, facing Sandburg, a renowned poet and novelist.

The photograph was taken in Sandburg’s home in Flat Rock, North Carolina, where Monroe came to gather information for a magazine article she was writing about the poet. The photograph is notable for its composition, showing an intimate glance between the two subjects. The piece also shows the contrast between Monroe’s glamorous public persona and Sandburg’s more serious and scholarly image.

Throughout his career, Newman came to photograph many other influential public figures like Igor Stravinsky, Max Ernst, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Jean Cocteau. Although he passed away in 2006, his legacy, along with the legacies of those he photographed, lives on through his incredible portraits. Admirers of Newman’s work may see his photographs in revolving exhibitions around the world and participate in various photography competitions in his honor, including one that is annually run by The Arnold and Augusta Newman Foundation which was established in 2007.

Manchester, 1968, by Shirley Baker

Baker: ‘I love the immediacy of unposed, spontaneous photographs and the ability of the camera to capture the serious, the funny, the sublime and the ridiculous. Despite the many wonderful pictures of the great and famous, I feel that less formal, quotidian images can often convey more of the life and spirit of the time’

A man who loved beautiful things

Rodney Smith: A Leap of Faith, by Paul Martineau (Getty Publications, 248 pp; $65)

by Bondo Wyszpolski

This is as much a luxury item as it is a volume of elegant, bewitching photographs, and it complements similarly-related books that Getty curator of photographs Paul Martineau has written for the institution’s publishing arm, in particular “Icons of Style: A Century of Fashion Photography” and “Herb Ritts: L.A. Style,” the latter also being catalogs in tandem with major exhibitions.

“Wessel Looking Over the Balcony, Paris, France” (2007); © 2023 Rodney Smith Ltd., courtesy of the Estate of Rodney Smith

These days, Rodney Smith (1947-2016) may be most recognizable thanks to his photograph, “Wessel Looking over the Balcony, Paris, France” (2007), which was reproduced as the cover for “A Gentleman in Moscow,” the best-selling novel by Amor Towles. That image alone conveys plenty about Smith’s aesthetic. As Rebecca A. Senf notes in one of the book’s essays, “For Smith, the print was everything. He was a man who loved beautiful things.”

Smith may be described or summarized as an American fashion photographer, but he was also one with an occasional playful touch. The humor, though, is restrained, held in check; he’s not fishing for the belly laugh. Graydon Carter (formerly an editor of Vanity Fair for 25 years) describes the look of a Smith photograph in these words, or rather this equation: “Wes Anderson + René Magritte ÷ Federico Fellini – Irving Penn = Rodney Smith.” He also adds that “A Rodney Smith (image) can be whimsical but solemn, composed but candid, still but full of movement, mysterious but revealing, desperate but funny.”

“Self-Portrait with Leslie, Siena, Italy” (1990); © 2023 Rodney Smith Ltd., courtesy of the Estate of Rodney Smith

That pretty much clears the bases, but this monograph covers Smith’s entire working life, which got underway in the early- and mid-1970s. He initially shot entirely in black and white, the images sharp and yet with a soft undertone. A few remind me of early 20th century Pictorialism, dialed up a notch. His 1990 photograph, “Self-Portrait with Leslie, Sienna, Italy,” might be an example of this, focused and soft at the same time.

Many of Smith’s later images have Gatsby-like young men and women in them, as if he was drawn to the New England jet set and edging closer to becoming something of a John Singer Sargent or William Merrit Chase of the fading millennium.

His earlier work, however, shows what he picked up from Walker Evans, who was one of his teachers, and, for example, a trip to Israel in 1976 — which yielded several timeless images — no doubt enhanced his eye and sharpened his sensibility. Tone, focus, visual texture, we see it in these pictures and also in those which he took in the American South, the United Kingdom, Haiti and France. Later, the poor people and the elderly would vanish from his work, but because they were there at the start they remain part of his artistic foundation.

“Edythe and Andrew Kissing on Top of Taxis, New York, New York” (2008); © 2023 Rodney Smith Ltd., courtesy of the Estate of Rodney Smith

Those earlier images or portraits also had a seriousness to them as well as a subject matter that wasn’t conducive to the whimsy or slight playfulness that emerged later. Senf also writes that, “For Smith, making pictures was the most joyous, freeing experience. It was what he lived for. Being on location was the epitome of being lost in the moment; he could shed the ordinary pressures of his daily life and be out and interacting with the world.”

As the above indicates, there were stressful times in Smith’s life, as there are in all sensitive people when the world at large places demands on them and has high expectations. But in photography Smith found his raison d’être, which was to create striking images.

To do this, though, a certain sensibility is required, and Smith appears to have had an intuitive sense of composition, the ability to take in all at once the shadows, shapes, colors or tones, and how they conspire with one another in some kind of harmonious fashion. And one has to be quick about this. There’s no time to hesitate. One sees, and must seize the moment.

“Don Jumping Over Hay Roll No. 1, Monkton, Maryland” (1999); © 2023 Rodney Smith Ltd., courtesy of the Estate of Rodney Smith

That said, everything doesn’t always fall into place just because we want it to. For example, there’s an image titled “Don Jumping over Hay Roll No. 1, Monkton, Maryland,” that Smith took in 1999. This wasn’t the result of just one snap and let’s go home, for later we are shown a contact sheet with 12 images of Don in midflight. A few of the others might have sufficed, but Smith zeroed in on the one he thought was best, and it’s hard to disagree.

It probably wasn’t difficult for Smith to slide into fashion photography because he’d done all the legwork, so to speak. He’d excelled in depicting quiet, serene, thought-inducing work, and so the sublime shifting into the elegant may perhaps have been a natural progression rather than, to reference the title of the book, making a leap of faith. Also, Smith apparently had a knack for getting people to relax and loosen up, which can pave the way into a successful photo shoot. One could say this is the first step, that of human interaction. Martineau talks about this in the book, when Smith was hired to make a series of corporate portraitures.

“Skyline, Hudson River, New York” (1995); © 2023 Rodney Smith Ltd., courtesy of the Estate of Rodney Smith

Despite his earliest images, one might also conclude that Smith was at his best as a portrait photographer. He avoided flashy crowd scenes and there are no images of soccer matches, volleyball games on the beach, or people pressing forward to board a subway. There is one picture taken in a stadium — “Shirley Seated in Grandstand, Long Island, New York” (1995) — and although Shirley has a pair of binoculars hanging from her neck she is the only person in the photo, surrounded by rows of empty seats.

Not surprisingly, then, Smith focused on classic fashion. He avoided or perhaps turned down shooting the Halloween costume styles that we often see on fashion runways, worn by anemic models, and one doubts that he would have been tempted by the celebrity peahens and peacocks of the annual Met Gala. Also, too, there are no titillating images in Smith’s fashion photography. One could contrast his work with Tim Walker’s, currently on view at the Getty Center. Both men mastered their craft, but their work is light years apart.

“Three Men with Shears No. 1, Reims, France” (1997); © 2023 Rodney Smith Ltd., courtesy of the Estate of Rodney Smith

What I like about Rodney Smith is that whimsical touch, mentioned earlier, which can be found in “Three Men with Shears No. 1, Reims, France” (1997), but also a more solemn image like “Bernadette Leaning Against Wall, Brooklyn, New York” (2000), which could have been a painting — like one of Anselm Feuerbach’s images of Nana — from well over a century ago.

This book is a lovely homage to the memory of a brilliant and sensitive photographer, and Paul Martineau, you are to be commended for bringing him to our attention. ER

Your background in professional dance continues to be an inexhaustible source for your projects. Looking at these photos feels like standing next to performers in a contemporary piece or watching a still from a Bill Viola’s video. At the same time we find references to Avedon and Muybridge. What do you look at to find inspiration for your work? What interests you about the movement of the body?

Luis Alberto Rodriguez: I simply can’t divorce my history as a dancer from my experience as a photographer. Dance and theater have shaped me, I will forever find inspiration in the endless unlocking of possibilities in the human body. Photography however is a newer love; a second wind for me. While I document form, an immense interest in portraiture has sprung.
I think of our bodies as vessels of information and communication. Each composed of the experiences in our lives that are unique to us. These histories inform the way they move through the world and I am fascinated by this. I am not particularly interested in making dance photography as it is too familiar to me. But I use the knowledge of the body I have to get a bit closer to some kind of honesty. 
I’ve been greatly inspired by many artists from both dance and photography; Martha Graham, Ohad Naharin, Jose Limon, George Balanchine, William Forsythe, Alvin Ailey, Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, Peter Hujar, Dana Lixenberg, August Sander, to name a few.

An intriguing aspect of the book is that it seems to have a great musicality, as if the pictures are crossed by a sound, sometimes weak, sometimes loud, that only the protagonists of the photos can hear. What role do silence and sound play in your images?

Luis Alberto Rodriguez: Sound is vital in the work. The title of the book stems from this question: What is the sound of these photos? If there was a sound the people in the book are making, what is that sound? What happens when we stop? How deep can we listen? ‘O’ is an open symbol for sound, continuity, it’s a gasp during a free fall, a collective wail.

© Luis Alberto Rodriguez 2023 courtesy Loose Joints