Louise Dahl-Wolfe (November 19, 1895 – December 11, 1989) was an American photographer. She is known primarily for her work for ''

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 st ...

'', in association with fashion editor

Diana Vreeland Diana Vreeland (September 29, 1903 – August 22, 1989) was a French-American fashion columnist and editor. She worked for the fashion magazine ''Harper's Bazaar'' and as editor-in-chief at ''Vogue (magazine), Vogue'', later becoming a special c ...

Background

Louise Emma Augusta Dahl was born November 19, 1895 in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

Norwegian Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe * Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway * Demographics of Norway *The Norwegian language, including ...

immigrant parents; she was the youngest of three daughters. In 1914, she began her studies at the

California School of Fine Arts San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI) was a private college of contemporary art in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1871, SFAI was one of the oldest art schools in the United States and the oldest west of the Mississippi River. Approximately ...

(now the San Francisco Institute of Art), where she studied design and color with

Rudolph Schaeffer Rudolph Frederick Schaeffer (June 26, 1886 – March 5, 1988) an American arts educator and artist connected to the Arts and Crafts movement. He was the founder of the Rudolph Schaeffer School of Design, a school that was based in San Francisco an ...

, and painting with

Frank Van Sloan Frank or Franks may refer to: People * Frank (given name) * Frank (surname) * Franks (surname) * Franks, a medieval Germanic people * Frank, a term in the Muslim world for all western Europeans, particularly during the Crusades - see Farang Cur ...

. She took life drawing, anatomy, figure composition courses and other subjects over the next six years. After graduating, Dahl-Wolfe worked in designing electric signs and interiors. In 1921, Dahl-Wolfe met with photographer

Anne Brigman Anne Wardrope Brigman (née Nott; December 3, 1869 – February 8, 1950) was an American photographer and one of the original members of the Photo-Secession movement in America. Her most famous images were taken between 1900 and 1920 and depict ...

, who inspired her to take up photography. Her first dark-room enlarger was a makeshift one she built herself, which used a tin can, an apple crate, and a part of a Ghirardelli chocolate box for a reflector. She studied design, decoration and architecture at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, New York in 1923. From 1927 to 1928, Dahl-Wolfe traveled with photographer

Consuelo Kanaga Consuelo Delesseps Kanaga (May 25, 1894 – 1978) was an American photographer and writer who became well known for her photographs of African-Americans. Life Kanaga was born on May 25, 1894, in Astoria, Oregon, the second child of Amos Ream Kan ...

, who furthered her interest in photography. Her first published photograph, titled ''Tennessee Mountain Woman'', was published in ''Vanity Fair'' (U.S. magazine 1913–36). In 1928 she married the American sculptor Meyer Wolfe, who constructed the backgrounds of many of her photos.

Career

Dahl-Wolfe was known for taking photographs outdoors, with natural light in distant locations from

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

in what became known as "environmental" fashion photography. Compared to other photographers at the time who were using red undertones, Dahl-Wolfe opted for cooler hues and also corrected her own proofs, with one example of her pulling proofs repeatedly to change a sofa's color from green to a dark magenta. Orson-Virginia-Christopher-Welles-1938

She preferred portraiture to fashion photography. Notable portraits include:

Mae West Mae West (born Mary Jane West; August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American stage and film actress, playwright, screenwriter, singer, and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned over seven decades. She was known for her breezy ...

Vivien Leigh Vivien Leigh ( ; 5 November 1913 – 8 July 1967; born Vivian Mary Hartley), styled as Lady Olivier after 1947, was a British actress. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice, for her definitive performances as Scarlett O'Hara in ''Gon ...

Cecil Beaton Sir Cecil Walter Hardy Beaton, (14 January 1904 – 18 January 1980) was a British fashion, portrait and war photographer, diarist, painter, and interior designer, as well as an Oscar–winning stage and costume designer for films and the theat ...

Eudora Welty Eudora Alice Welty (April 13, 1909 – July 23, 2001) was an American short story writer, novelist and photographer who wrote about the American South. Her novel ''The Optimist's Daughter'' won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Welty received numero ...

W. H. Auden Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...

Christopher Isherwood Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood (26 August 1904 – 4 January 1986) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist. His best-known works include '' Goodbye to Berlin'' (1939), a semi-autobiographical ...

Orson Welles George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) was an American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter, known for his innovative work in film, radio and theatre. He is considered to be among the greatest and most influential f ...

Carson McCullers Carson McCullers (February 19, 1917 – September 29, 1967) was an American novelist, short-story writer, playwright, essayist, and poet. Her first novel, ''The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter'' (1940), explores the spiritual isolation of misfits ...

Edward Hopper Edward Hopper (July 22, 1882 – May 15, 1967) was an American realist painter and printmaker. While he is widely known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolorist and printmaker in etching. Hopper created subdued drama ...

Colette Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (; 28 January 1873 – 3 August 1954), known mononymously as Colette, was a French author and woman of letters. She was also a mime, actress, and journalist. Colette is best known in the English-speaking world for her ...

and

Josephine Baker Josephine Baker (born Freda Josephine McDonald; naturalised French Joséphine Baker; 3 June 1906 – 12 April 1975) was an American-born French dancer, singer and actress. Her career was centered primarily in Europe, mostly in her adopted Fran ...

. She is known for her role in the discovery of a teenage

Lauren Bacall Lauren Bacall (; born Betty Joan Perske; September 16, 1924 – August 12, 2014) was an American actress. She was named the 20th-greatest female star of classic Hollywood cinema by the American Film Institute and received an Academy Honorary Aw ...

whom she photographed for the March 1943 cover of ''

''. One of her favourite subjects was the model

Mary Jane Russell Mary Jane Russell (July 10, 1926 – November 20, 2003) was a New York City-based American photographic fashion model active from 1948 to 1961. She often worked with Louise Dahl-Wolfe and Irving Penn, and appeared on many covers for ''Vogue'' ...

, who is estimated to have appeared in about thirty percent of Dahl-Wolfe's photographs. She was a great influence on photographers

Irving Penn Irving Penn (June 16, 1917October 7, 2009) was an American photographer known for his fashion photography, portraits, and still lifes. Penn's career included work at ''Vogue'' magazine, and independent advertising work for clients including Is ...

and

Richard Avedon Richard Avedon (May 15, 1923 – October 1, 2004) was an American fashion and portrait photographer. He worked for ''Harper's Bazaar'', ''Vogue'' and ''Elle'' specializing in capturing movement in still pictures of fashion, theater and danc ...

. One of her assistants was fashion and celebrity photographer, Milton H. Greene. From 1933 to 1960, Dahl-Wolfe operated a

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

photographic studio that was home to the freelance advertising and fashion work she made for stores including

Bonwit Teller Bonwit Teller & Co. was an American luxury department store in New York City, New York, founded by Paul Bonwit in 1895 at Sixth Avenue and 18th Street, and later a chain of department stores. In 1897, Edmund D. Teller was admitted to the p ...

and

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

. From 1936 to 1958 Dahl-Wolfe was a staff fashion photographer 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 st ...

''. She produced portrait and fashion photographs totaling 86 covers, 600 color pages and countless black-and-white shots. She worked with editor

Carmel Snow Carmel Snow, born Carmel White (21 August 1887 – 7 May 1961), was the editor-in-chief of the American edition of ''Harper's Bazaar'' from 1934 to 1958; and the chair of the magazine's editorial board. She was famously quoted as saying, "E ...

, art director

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 ...

and fashion editor

, and traveled widely. In 1950, she was selected for "America's Outstanding Woman Photographers" in the September issue of
Foto
'. From 1958 until her retirement in 1960, Dahl-Wolfe worked as a freelance photographer for ''

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'', ...

'', ''

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence twic ...

'', and other periodicals. Dalhl-Wolfe lived many of her later years in

Nashville, Tennessee Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the List of muni ...

. She died in

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severity ...

in 1989. The full archive of Dahl-Wolfe's work is located at the

Center for Creative Photography The Center for Creative Photography (CCP), established in 1975 and located on the University of Arizona's Tucson campus, is a research facility and archival repository containing the full archives of over sixty of the most famous American pho ...

(CCP) at the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory. T ...

Tucson , "(at the) base of the black ill , nicknames = "The Old Pueblo", "Optics Valley", "America's biggest small town" , image_map = , mapsize = 260px , map_caption = Interactive map ...

, which also manages the copyright of her work. In 1999, her work was the subject of a documentary film entitled '' Louise Dahl-Wolfe: Painting with Light''. The film featured the only surviving modern footage of Dahl-Wolfe, including extensive interviews. It was written and directed by

Tom Neff Thomas Linden Neff (born 1953)-, known as Tom Neff, is an American film executive, director and producer, born in Chicago, Illinois. He lives in Nashville, Tennessee. Education Neff received his Bachelor of Arts from Lawrence University with a ...

, edited by

Barry Rubinow Barry Rubinow (born 1956) is a film executive and editor, born in Glen Rock, New Jersey, a suburb of New York City.. Currently, he lives in West Hills, Los Angeles, California. Education Rubinow received his Bachelor of Arts from Bucknell Unive ...

and produced by Neff and Madeline Bell.

Style

Among the celebrated fashion photographers of the 20th century, Louise Dahl-Wolfe was an innovator and influencer who significantly contributed to the fashion world. She was most widely known for her work with

. Dahl-Wolfe was considered a pioneer of the '

female gaze The female gaze is a feminist theory term referring to the gaze of the female spectator, character or director of an artistic work, but more than the gender it is an issue of representing women as subjects having agency. As such all genders can cre ...

' in the fashion industry. Dahl-Wolfe created the new image of American women during the world war II. They were strong and independent. Dahl-Wolfe often shot on location and outdoors, bringing her models out of the studio and to exotic locales such as Tunisia, Cuba and South America. Her models pose candidly, almost as if Dahl-Wolfe had just walked in on them. Dahl-Wolf innovatively used color in photography and mainly concerned with the qualities of natural lighting, composition, and balance. Her methodology in using natural sunlight and shooting outdoors became the industry standard even now.

World War II

When the Nazi occupation of Paris began on 14 June 1940, the Fashion Group in the city of New York promoted and protected the business of fashion, called a meeting to discuss the impact would have on American commerce. Having just recovered from the economic devastation of the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

, the fashion manufactures being cut off from French designs. Some were hesitant to continue without the guideline of Europe, but many were decided to survive through the war by promoting a unique “American Look.” Louise Dahl-Wolfe was characterized by the "American Look," which set a beauty standard and trend in fashion. “She is the most important woman, fashion photographer of the first half of the 20th century,” according to photographic expert Terrence Pepper and for Valerie Steele, the vitality and dynamism in Dahl-Wolfe’s work “were a big part of the rise of the American look.” In 1943, President

Franklin Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

proclaimed the whole month of March as “Red Cross Month,” and the campaign raised $125 million war fund. This campaign demanded the most substantial amount of money in American history. Alongside with the tough circumstance, contemporary American women and professionals in the fashion industry, joined together to form a new style.

Selected works

Harper’s Bazaar cover, March 1943

Dahl-Wolfe dedicated to promoting patriotism in fashion in the World War II era. Her photography highlights the implications of World War II in the American fashion industry. The Harper’s Bazaar cover, March 1943, was one of the iconic photographs from Louise Dahl-Wolfe. The cover shows a young lady in front of the reception of

American Red Cross The American Red Cross (ARC), also known as the American National Red Cross, is a non-profit humanitarian organization that provides emergency assistance, disaster relief, and disaster preparedness education in the United States. It is the desi ...

Blood Donation clinic. She is styling chicly in an elegant navy suit, white blouse, black gloves, a cloche hat with long waves in her hair and holding a red bag with matching lipstick. The young woman looks either waiting to go inside to donate or about to leave the Red Cross blood donor room. The expression on her face is nonchalant with a suggestion that she does not attend the blood donation clinic regularly. Her eyes are empty. She may be disappointed or sad or helpless just as any other American woman knowing the reality is no one can escape. The audience can sense the uncertainty in the air of the time from her expression. At the height of World War II, women had been left at home after their male counterparts were sent abroad to fight. The woman in the cover represented all American women who determined to do their part to contribute to the war. American women in World War II were no longer the delicate creature surrounded by flowers as seen in previous covers, but responsible individuals with the ability to do their bit of help. Harper’s Bazaar cover from March 1943, on the other hand, shows the power that women have gained in society. The cover is a mirror up to its audience, a reflection of the women, who had entered the workforce for the first time, who became wartime brides when they married their soldier, who take care family and just an occasional letter from a loved one to lament over. The model in the cover was 18-year-old

, who was a successful actress in Hollywood. According to David Thomson, it was

, who worked for both Harper’s Bazaar and

, who discovered Lauren Bacall and placed her on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar.

References

External links

Museum of Contemporary Photography Collection

Louise Dahl-Wolfe Profile
at the National Museum of Women in the Arts
''Louise Dahl-Wolfe: Painting with Light''
at the DOC: The Documentary Channel
Louise Dahl-Wolfe FindingAid at the Center for Creative Photography

Louise Dahl-Wolfe Images Online Center for Creative Photography (CCP)
CCP at the University of Arizona has released a digital catalog of all Dahl-Wolfe's images. {{DEFAULTSORT:Dahl-Wolfe, Louise Fashion photographers American portrait photographers 1895 births 1989 deaths American people of Norwegian descent Artists from San Francisco Photographers from California Deaths from pneumonia in New Jersey 20th-century American photographers 20th-century American women photographers