Irving Penn (June 16, 1917October 7, 2009) was an American photographer known for his

fashion photography Fashion photography is a genre of photography which is devoted to displaying clothing and other fashion items, sometimes haute couture. It typically consists of a fashion photographer taking a picture of a dressed model (person), model in a photo ...

portraits A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expressions are predominant. The intent is to display the likeness, personality, and even the mood of the person. For thi ...

, and

still life A still life (plural: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or man-made (drinking glasses, bo ...

s. Penn's career included work at ''

Vogue Vogue may refer to: Business * ''Vogue'' (magazine), a US fashion magazine ** British ''Vogue'', a British fashion magazine ** ''Vogue Arabia'', an Arab fashion magazine ** ''Vogue Australia'', an Australian fashion magazine ** ''Vogue China'', ...

'' magazine, and independent advertising work for clients including Issey Miyake and Clinique. His work has been exhibited internationally and continues to inform the art of photography.

Early life and education

Penn was born to a

Russian Jewish The history of the Jews in Russia and areas historically connected with it goes back at least 1,500 years. Jews in Russia have historically constituted a large religious and ethnic diaspora; the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest pop ...

family on June 16, 1917 in Plainfield, New Jersey, to Harry Penn and Sonia Greenberg. Penn's younger brother, Arthur Penn, was born in 1922 and would go on to become a film director and producer. Penn attended Abraham Lincoln High School where he studied graphic design with Leon Friend. Penn attended the Philadelphia Museum School of Industrial Art (now the University of the Arts) from 1934 to 1938, where he studied drawing, painting, graphics, and industrial arts under

Alexey Brodovitch Alexey Vyacheslavovich Brodovitch (also Brodovich; be, Аляксей Брадовіч, russian: Алексе́й Вячесла́вович Бродо́вич; 1898 – April 15, 1971) was a Russian-born American photographer, designer ...

. While still a student, Penn worked under Brodovitch at ''

Harper's Bazaar ''Harper's Bazaar'' is an American monthly women's fashion magazine. It was first published in New York City on November 2, 1867, as the weekly ''Harper's Bazar''. ''Harper's Bazaar'' is published by Hearst and considers itself to be the ...

'' which published several of Penn's drawings.

Career

Penn worked as a freelance designer for three years taking his first amateur photographs before taking Brodovitch's position as the art director at

Saks Fifth Avenue Saks Fifth Avenue (originally Saks & Company; colloquially Saks) is an American luxury department store chain headquartered in New York City and founded by Andrew Saks. The original store opened in the F Street shopping district of Washingt ...

in 1940. Penn remained at Saks Fifth Avenue for a year before leaving to spend a year painting and taking photographs in Mexico and across the US. When Penn returned to New York, Alexander Liberman offered him a position as an associate in ''

'' magazine's Art Department. Penn worked on layout for the magazine before Liberman asked him to try photography. Penn's first photographic cover for ''Vogue'' magazine appeared in October 1943. The art department of the Office of War Information in London offered him a job as an "artist-photographer" but he volunteered with the American Field Service instead. After arriving in Naples with a boatload of American troops in November 1944. Penn drove an ambulance in support of the

British Eighth Army The Eighth Army was an Allied field army formation of the British Army during the Second World War, fighting in the North African and Italian campaigns. Units came from Australia, British India, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Free French Force ...

as it alternately waited out weather and slogged its way north through a miserable winter in the Italian

Apennines The Apennines or Apennine Mountains (; grc-gre, links=no, Ἀπέννινα ὄρη or Ἀπέννινον ὄρος; la, Appenninus or – a singular with plural meaning;''Apenninus'' (Greek or ) has the form of an adjective, which wou ...

. In July 1945, he was transferred from Italy to India. He photographed the soldiers, medical operations, and camp life for the AFS, and various subjects while bivouacked in India. He sailed back to New York in November 1945. Penn continued to work at ''Vogue'' throughout his career, photographing covers, portraits, still-lifes, fashion, and photographic essays. In the 1950s, Penn founded his own studio in New York and began making advertising photographs. Over the years, Penn's list of clients grew to include General Foods, De Beers, Issey Miyake, and Clinique. Penn met Swedish fashion model

Lisa Fonssagrives Lisa or LISA may refer to: People People with the mononym * Lisa Lisa (born 1967), American actress and lead singer of the Cult Jam * Lisa (Japanese musician, born 1974), stylized "LISA", Japanese singer and producer * Lisa Komine (born 1978), ...

at a photo shoot in 1947. In 1950, the two married at Chelsea Register Office, and two years later Lisa gave birth to their son, Tom Penn, who would become a metal designer. Lisa Fonssagrives died in 1992. Penn died aged 92 on October 7, 2009 at his home in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

.''New York Times'' obituary by Andy Grundberg, October 8, 2009
/ref>

Photography

Best known for his fashion photography, Penn's repertoire also included portraits of creative greats; ethnographic photographs from around the world; Modernist still-life works of food, bones, bottles, metal, and found objects; and photographic travel essays. Penn was among the earliest photographers to pose subjects against a simple grey or white backdrop and he effectively used its simplicity. During his early years at Vogue, the magazine's art director, Penn developed a bold graphic sensibility that complemented Penn's chic images and embodied modern taste. His use of monochromatic backdrops of black, white, or gray allowed him complete control of natural lighting conditions and enhanced the visual simplicity of his photographs. In an era when elaborate artificial lighting was the norm, his work stood out from the rest and influenced subsequent fashion photography. Expanding his austere studio surroundings, Penn constructed a set of upright angled backdrops, to form a stark, acute corner. Subjects photographed with this technique included John Hersey,

Martha Graham Martha Graham (May 11, 1894 – April 1, 1991) was an American modern dancer and choreographer. Her style, the Graham technique, reshaped American dance and is still taught worldwide. Graham danced and taught for over seventy years. She ...

Marcel Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...

Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

, Georgia O'Keeffe, W. H. Auden, and

Igor Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century clas ...

. Penn's still life compositions are sparse and highly organized, assemblages of food or objects that articulate the abstract interplay of line and volume. Penn's photographs are composed with a great attention to detail, which continues into his craft of developing and making prints of his photographs. Penn experimented with many printing techniques, including prints made on aluminum sheets coated with a platinum emulsion rendering the image with a warmth that untoned silver prints lacked. His black and white prints are notable for their deep contrast, giving them a clean, crisp look. While steeped in the Modernist tradition, Penn also ventured beyond creative boundaries. The exhibition ''Earthly Bodies'' consisted of series of posed nudes whose physical shapes range from thin to plump; while the photographs were taken in 1949 and 1950, they were not exhibited until 1980. He continued to capture collections by his favorite designers, such as John Galliano for Dior, Karl Lagerfeld for Chanel, and Christian Lacroix, for Vogue, incorporating these darker themes into his images.

Exhibitions

*1975: ''Irving Penn: Recent Works, Photographs of Cigarettes'', Museum of Modern Art, New York *1975: ''I Platini di Irving Penn: 25 Anni di Fotografia'', Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna, Turin *1975: ''Irving Penn: Platinum Plates'',

The Photographers' Gallery The Photographers' Gallery was founded in London by Sue Davies opening on 14 January 1971, as the first public gallery in the United Kingdom devoted solely to photography. It is also home to the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize, established ...

, London *1977: ''Irving Penn: Street Material. Photographs in Platinum Metals'', The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York *1980: Exhibition at the Center for Visual Arts, Oakland, California *1984: ''Irving Penn'', a retrospective, The Museum of Modern Art, New York *1986: ''Irving Penn: Printemps des arts de Monte Carlo'', Monte Carlo *1990: ''Irving Penn: Master Images'', National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. *1990: ''Irving Penn: Platinum Test Material'', Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona *1994: ''Irving Penn: Collection Privée/Privatsammlung'', Musée d'Art et d'Histoire, Fribourg, Switzerland *1995: ''Irving Penn Photographs: A Donation in Memory of Lisa Fonssagrives-Penn'', Moderna Museet, Stockholm *1997: ''Le Bain: Dancers' Workshop of San Francisco'', Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris *1997: ''Irving Penn: A Career in Photography'',

The Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mil ...

*2001: ''Irving Penn: Objects (Still Lifes) for the Printed Page'', Museum Folkwang, Essen *2002: ''Dancer: 1999 Nudes by Irving Penn'', Whitnew Museum of American Art, New York *2002: ''Earthly Bodies: Irving Penn's Nudes, 1949–1950'', The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York *2004: ''Dahomey (1967)'', The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston *2005: ''Irving Penn: Platinum Prints'', the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. *2008: ''Close Encounters'', Morgan Library & Museum, New York *2009: ''The Small Trades'', J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles: a collection of 252 full-length portraits by Penn from 1950 to 1951 *2010: Exhibition at the

National Portrait Gallery (London) The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) is an art gallery in London housing a collection of portraits of historically important and famous British people. It was arguably the first national public gallery dedicated to portraits in the world when it ...

: an exhibit of over 120 portraits of people from the worlds of literature, music and the visual and performing arts *2012: ''Irving Penn: Diverse Worlds'', Museum of Modern Art (Moderna Museet), Malmö, Sweden *2013: ''Irving Penn: On Assignment'', Pace Gallery, New York City, New York. *2015-2016: ''Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty'', career retrospective of 146 photographs at the

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds ...

. *2017: ''Irving Penn: Centennial'',

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, New York City; ''Irving Penn - Le Centenaire,'' Grand Palais, Paris.

Major collections

The Art Institute of Chicago holds the Irving Penn Paper and Photographic Archives, which were donated to the Ryerson and Burnham Libraries and the Department of Photography in 1995. In addition, the Art Institute of Chicago has more than 200 of Penn's fine art prints in its collection, and has mounted several exhibitions of work by the artist including the retrospective ''Irving Penn: A Career in Photography'' (1997–1998) which traveled internationally as well as ''Irving Penn: Underfoot'' (2013). The Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM) possesses a large collection of Penn's works, including a silver gelatin print of Penn's ''The Tarot Reader'', a photograph from 1949 of Jean Patchett and surrealist

painter Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ...

Bridget Tichenor.The Tarot Reader (Jean Patchett and Bridget Tichenor) - New York 1949 by Irving Penn SAAM
/ref> In 2013, the museum received 100 images as a gift from the Irving Penn Foundation, significantly increasing the number of Penn's works in the collection to 161 images.Ashley Southall (August 9, 2013)
Irving Penn Photographs to Bolster Smithsonian Collection
''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''. The Irving Penn Foundation's gift formed the basis of the exhibition, ''Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty,'' which was shown at SAAM before traveling to other museum venues around the United States.

Awards

*1987: The Cultural Award from the German Society for Photography (DGPh)The Cultural Award of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie (DGPh)
. Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie e.V.. Accessed 7 March 2017.

Bibliography

*''Moments Preserved''. 1960 *''Worlds in a Small Room''. 1974. *''Inventive Paris Clothes, 1909–1939''. 1977. *''Flowers''. 1980. *''Passage''. 1991. *''Drawings''. 1999. *''The Astronomers Plan a Voyage to Earth''. 1999. *''Irving Penn Regards The Work of Issey Miyake''. 1999. *''Still Life''. 2001. *''A Notebook at Random''. 2004. *''Photographs of Dahomey''. 2004.

References

External links

Irving Penn FoundationVoguepedia Irving PennIrving Penn Archives
at the Art Institute of Chicago
Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty
- online image gallery from 2015-2016

exhibition
Irving Penn: Small Trades at the J. Paul Getty Museum
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Penn, Irving 1917 births 2009 deaths Commercial photographers Fashion photographers Food photographers Interior photographers American portrait photographers Photographers from New York (state) American people of Russian-Jewish descent Jewish American artists People from Manhattan People from Plainfield, New Jersey 20th-century American photographers 21st-century American photographers 20th-century American male artists 21st-century American male artists Photographers from New Jersey 20th-century American Jews 21st-century American Jews Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni American Field Service personnel of World War II