This is a new series on the blog to highlight some of the ‘past masters’ that have inspired us all on our street photography journeys. This may not reveal any hidden gems, but will hopefully be a revealing series to allow the reader to view photobooks, images and you tube videos.

Garry Winogrand

was one of the most influential and prolific street photographers of the 20th century. His candid and dynamic images captured the essence of American life and culture from the 1950s to the early 1980s. He was a master of the snapshot aesthetic, using a wide-angle lens and a hand-held camera to create spontaneous and often tilted compositions that reflected his restless and energetic vision.

Winogrand was born in the Bronx, New York, in 1928, to Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. He studied painting at City College of New York and Columbia University, and later took a photojournalism course with Alexey Brodovitch, the legendary art director of Harper's Bazaar. He started his career as a freelance photojournalist and commercial photographer, working for magazines such as Collier's, Pageant, and Sports Illustrated.

In the late 1950s, Winogrand became interested in street photography, inspired by the work of Walker Evans, Robert Frank, and Henri Cartier-Bresson. He began to roam the streets of New York with his Leica camera, shooting incessantly and intuitively, without stopping to compose or focus. He was fascinated by the drama and chaos of urban life, and the way people interacted with each other and their environment. He once said, "I photograph to see what the world looks like in photographs."

Winogrand's style was unconventional and controversial. He often cropped his subjects' heads or limbs, or included distracting elements in the frame. He did not care about technical perfection or formal balance. He wanted to create images that were more interesting or more beautiful than what was photographed. He also challenged the conventions of documentary photography, which aimed to capture reality objectively and truthfully. He argued that photography was not about the thing photographed, but about how that thing looked photographed. He said, "When you put four edges around some facts, you change those facts."

Winogrand's work was recognized and supported by John Szarkowski, the influential curator of photography at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 1967, Winogrand was featured in the landmark exhibition New Documents, along with Diane Arbus and Lee Friedlander, which showcased a new generation of photographers who explored the social and psychological aspects of contemporary America. Winogrand also received several grants from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, which allowed him to travel across the country and document various aspects of American society, such as politics, media, sports, zoos, airports, and women.

Winogrand published four books during his lifetime:

The Fort Worth Fat Stock Show and Rodeo 1980.jpg

The Animals (1969), which showed the similarities and differences between humans and animals in zoos;
Women are Beautiful (1975), which celebrated the beauty and diversity of women in public spaces;
Public Relations (1977), which exposed the staged and artificial nature of public events and media spectacles; and
Stock Photographs: The Fort Worth Fat Stock Show and Rodeo (1980), which depicted the culture and rituals of the Texas rodeo. He also taught photography at several institutions, such as the Institute of Design in Chicago, the University of Texas at Austin, and the School of Visual Arts in New York.

Winogrand was a compulsive shooter, who often did not have time or interest to edit or print his work. He left behind a massive archive of over 300,000 unedited images, including 2,500 rolls of undeveloped film. He died of cancer in 1984, at the age of 56, while living in Los Angeles. His work has been posthumously exhibited and published by several curators and critics, who have attempted to make sense of his chaotic and unfinished legacy. His most recent retrospective, Garry Winogrand: All Things are Photographable, was organized by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 2013, and traveled to several venues, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Jeu de Paume in Paris.

Winogrand's influence on street photography and contemporary art

is undeniable. He inspired generations of photographers and artists who followed his example of capturing the complexity and vitality of everyday life with a personal and expressive approach. He also challenged the viewers to question their assumptions and expectations about photography and reality. He once said, "There is nothing as mysterious as a fact clearly described."

Some of Winogrand's famous quotes are:

- "No one moment is most important. Any moment can be something."

- "Photography is about finding out what can happen in the frame. When you put four edges around some facts, you change those facts."

- "You have a lifetime to learn technique. But I can teach you what is more important than technique, how to see; learn that and all you have to do afterwards is press the shutter."

- "I don't have anything to say in any picture. My only interest in photography is to see what something looks like as a photograph. I have no preconceptions."

- "The photograph should be more interesting or more beautiful than what was photographed."

- "A photograph is the illusion of a literal description of how the camera 'saw' a piece of time and space."

- "Great photography is always on the edge of failure."

- "Photos have no narrative content. They only describe light on surface."

- "When I'm photographing I see life. That's what I deal with."

- "All things are photographable."

Some of Winogrand's endorsements from his peers are:

- John Szarkowski: "Winogrand was the central photographer of his generation."

- Robert Frank: "He was a poet of the streets."

- Lee Friedlander: "He was a bull of a man and a prince."

- Geoff Dyer: "He was the epic poet of American energy and insecurity."

- Joel Meyerowitz: "He was a force of nature, a tornado, a tsunami."

- Tod Papageorge: "He was the Mozart of American photography."

Some of Winogrand's famous photos are:

Some of Winogrand's YouTube videos are:

Garry Winogrand by Great Photographers: This video is a 48-minute documentary on the life and work of Garry Winogrand, featuring interviews with his colleagues and friends. It provides an in-depth look at his photography style and his contribution to the art of street photography. You can watch it here.

Garry Winogrand - Photographer by Michael Engler: This 7-minute video is a cinematic workshop discussion about contemporary photography in the USA. It provides a brief overview of Winogrand’s life and career and features some of his iconic photographs. You can watch it here.

Garry Winogrand’s Early Career by American Masters PBS: This 1.5-minute video is a brief introduction to Winogrand’s early career as a photojournalist before he became a fine art photographer. You can watch it here.
ing, 03/11/2023