Bert Hardy
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Albert William Thomas Hardy (19 May 1913 – 3 July 1995) was an English documentary and press photographer known for his work published in the '' Picture Post'' magazine between 1941 and 1957.


Life and work

Born in Blackfriars, Bert Hardy rose from humble working class origins in Southwark, London. The eldest of seven children, he left school at age 14 to work for a
chemist A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties. Chemists carefully describe th ...
who also processed photos. His first big sale came in 1936 when he photographed
King George V George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936. Born during the reign of his grandmother Que ...
and Queen Mary in a passing carriage during the Silver Jubilee celebrations, and sold 200 small prints of his best view of the King. His first assignment, at age 23, was to photograph Hungarian actor Sakall at the Mayfair Hotel.Gordon Fraser Photographic Monographs: Bert Hardy; Introduction by Tom Hopkinson; London 1975; page 8 Hardy freelanced for ''The Bicycle'' magazine, and bought his first small-format 35 mm Leica. He signed on with the General Photographic Agency as a photographer, then founded his own freelance firm Criterion.


''Picture Post'' and World War II

In 1941, Hardy was recruited by the then editor
Tom Hopkinson Sir Henry Thomas Hopkinson (19 April 1905 – 20 June 1990) was a British journalist, picture magazine editor, author, and teacher. Early life Born in Manchester, his father was a Church of England clergyman and a scholar, and his mother had ...
of the leading picture publication of the 1930s to the 1950s, '' Picture Post''. Founded in 1938 and funded by publisher Edward Hulton, the magazine's first editor was Hungarian émigré
Stefan Lorant Stefan Lorant ( hu, Lóránt István; February 22, 1901 in Budapest, Austria-Hungary – November 14, 1997 in Rochester, Minnesota) was a pioneering Hungarian-American filmmaker, photojournalist, and author. Early work He was born on February 22 ...
(1901–97) assisted by Hopkinson, who took over as editor from 1940. The picture-centric, left-leaning and reasonably-priced publication was highly successful and circulation soon rose to over a million. Hardy's photographer colleagues included
Felix H. Man Hans Felix Sigismund Baumann aka Felix H. Man (November 30, 1893 – January 30, 1985) was a photographer and later an art collector.Thurston Hopkins Godfrey Thurston Hopkins (16 April 1913 – 27 October 2014), known as Thurston Hopkins, was a well-known British ''Picture Post'' photojournalist and a centenarian. Education Hopkins was born on 16 April 1913 in south London, son of Sybil (nà ...
,
Kurt Hutton Kurt Hutton (born Kurt Hübschmann; 1893 in Strasbourg – 1960) was a German-born photographer who pioneered photojournalism in England. Life Beginning his career with the Dephot agency in Germany, he migrated to England in 1934 and worked for ...
, Leonard McCombe,
Francis Reiss Francis Reiss (1927 – 4 December 2017) was an Australian photographer, born to Danish parents in Hamburg, Germany. He was best known for his work for ''Picture Post'' and ''Life'' magazines. Early life Reiss was born in 1927 in Hamburg, Germ ...
,
Humphrey Spender Humphrey Spender (19 April 1910 – 11 March 2005) was a British photographer, painter, and designer. Family and education Humphrey Spender was the third son of Harold Spender, a journalist and writer. Humphrey's mother, Violet Schuster, came ...
,
Grace Robertson Grace Robertson (13 July 1930Ms Grace Robertson, OBE
Debret ...
and
Bill Brandt Bill Brandt (born Hermann Wilhelm Brandt; 2 May 1904 – 20 December 1983)Paul DelanyBill Brandt: A Life was a British photographer and photojournalist. Born in Germany, Brandt moved to England, where he became known for his images of British ...
, who went out with the writers on stories together, working as colleagues, not competitors. Hardy was self-taught and used a Leica—unconventional gear for press photographers of the era—but went on to become the ''Posts Chief Photographer, after he earned his first photographer credit for his 1 February 1941 photo-essay about Blitz-stressed fire-fighters. Hardy served as a
war photographer ''War Photographer'' is a documentary by Christian Frei about the photographer James Nachtwey. As well as telling the story of an iconic man in the field of war photography, the film addresses the broader scope of ideas common to all those inv ...
in the
Army Film and Photographic Unit The Army Film and Photographic Unit was a subdivision of the British armed forces set up on 24 October 1941, to record military events in which the British and Commonwealth armies was engaged. During the war, almost 23 percent of all AFPU soldier ...
(AFPU) from 1942 until 1946: he took part in the
D-Day The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on Tuesday, 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. Codenamed Operation Neptune and often referred to as D ...
landings in June 1944; covered the liberation of Paris; the allied advance across the
Rhine ), Surselva, Graubünden, Switzerland , source1_coordinates= , source1_elevation = , source2 = Rein Posteriur/Hinterrhein , source2_location = Paradies Glacier, Graubünden, Switzerland , source2_coordinates= , so ...
; and was one of the first photographers to enter the liberated Belsen to record the suffering there. He also saved some Russian slaves from a fire set by German police in the city of Osnabrück, before photographing the aftermath. Near the end of World War II, Hardy went to Asia, where he became Lord Mountbatten's personal photographer. He later went on to cover the
Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...
along with journalist
James Cameron James Francis Cameron (born August 16, 1954) is a Canadian filmmaker. A major figure in the post-New Hollywood era, he is considered one of the industry's most innovative filmmakers, regularly pushing the boundaries of cinematic capability w ...
for ''Picture Post'', reporting on atrocities committed by
Syngman Rhee Syngman Rhee (, ; 26 March 1875 – 19 July 1965) was a South Korean politician who served as the first president of South Korea from 1948 to 1960. Rhee was also the first and last president of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Ko ...
's police under the United Nations flag at
Pusan Busan (), officially known as is South Korea's most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.4 million inhabitants. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economic, cultural and educational center of southeastern South Korea, w ...
in 1950, and later on that war's turning point, the
Battle of Inchon The Battle of Incheon (), also spelled Battle of Inchon, was an amphibious invasion and a battle of the Korean War that resulted in a decisive victory and strategic reversal in favor of the United Nations Command (UN). The operation involved so ...
, photojournalism for which he won the Missouri Pictures of the Year Award.


Late career

Hardy stayed on until ''Picture Post'' ceased publication in June 1957. It succumbed to the rise of television and falling circulation, and its increasingly unpopular identification with Labour's 'New Britain' and 'Fair Shares for All'; the party being defeated in the 1951 election. There being no other outlets for photojournalists, Hardy became an advertising photographer before giving the medium up altogether to become a farmer in 1964.


Recognition

Three of Hardy's photos were used in
Edward Steichen Edward Jean Steichen (March 27, 1879 – March 25, 1973) was a Luxembourgish American photographer, painter, and curator, renowned as one of the most prolific and influential figures in the history of photography. Steichen was credited with tr ...
's famous ''
The Family of Man ''The Family of Man'' was an ambitious exhibition of 503 photography, photographs from 68 countries curated by Edward Steichen, the director of the New York City Museum of Modern Art's (MoMA) Department of Photography. According to Steichen, ...
'' exhibition and book; two were taken in Burma, including one of a monk at his desk in deep thought. Another shows a young couple, much in love and relaxing by the window of a tiny basement flat, photographed for part of a feature in ''Picture Post'' magazine, 'Scenes From The Elephant', published 8 January 1949, on everyday life in the Elephant and Castle district of South London. According to Hardy, the man in that portrait was a Canadian recently released from prison who had just spent a night with the prostitute in the photographer's image. One of his most famous, and Hardy long claimed his favorite, photo, shows two street urchins off on a lark in Gorbals, an image which has come to represent Hardy's keenest documentary skill. He said he liked it so much because it represented his own rough-and-tumble upbringing, with Glasgow's Gorbals very much resembling London's Elephant & Castle District. Hardy himself was photographed many times, including during the war; three very good photo-portraits of him are currently in the Photographs Collection of the
National Portrait Gallery National Portrait Gallery may refer to: *National Portrait Gallery (Australia), in Canberra *National Portrait Gallery (Sweden), in Mariefred *National Portrait Gallery (United States), in Washington, D.C. *National Portrait Gallery, London, with s ...
. Having written an article for amateur photographers suggesting that you didn't need an expensive camera to take good pictures, Hardy staged a carefully posed photograph of two young women sitting on railings above a breezy Blackpool promenade using a Box Brownie in 1951, a photograph which has since become an iconic image of post-war Britain. Just before ''Picture Post'' closed, Hardy took 15 photos of the Queen's entrance at the
Paris Opera The Paris Opera (, ) is the primary opera and ballet company of France. It was founded in 1669 by Louis XIV as the , and shortly thereafter was placed under the leadership of Jean-Baptiste Lully and officially renamed the , but continued to be ...
on 8 April 1957, which were assembled as a photo-montage by the magazine's technicians. It was one of the most challenging photo-montages ever created, because there were a sizeable live crowd, guards, and other dignitaries, in front of his camera. After leaving ''Picture Post'' Hardy became one of the most successful advertising photographers until his retirement in 1964 to his farm in
Oxted Oxted is a town and civil parish in the Tandridge district of Surrey, England, at the foot of the North Downs. It is south south-east of Croydon in Greater London, west of Sevenoaks in Kent, and north of East Grinstead in West Sussex. Oxte ...
. His second wife, Sheila, was a photo researcher for ''Picture Post'' and still holds the copyright to his private collection of photos;
Getty Images Getty Images Holdings, Inc. is an American visual media company and is a supplier of stock images, editorial photography, video and music for business and consumers, with a library of over 477 million assets. It targets three markets— creative ...
holds the copyright to his '' Picture Post'' works. A memorial plaque honouring him is in the journalists' church, St Bride's, Fleet Street, London. In October 2008, London Borough of Southwark unveiled a Blue Plaque on Bert Hardy's family home at The Priory, Webber Street, Southwark. The plaque was erected following a popular vote.John Prendergast (17 October 2008
BIG FAMILY TURNOUT FOR THE SNAPPER WHO DOCUMENTED THE ELEPHANT
southwarkweekender.co.uk


Bibliography

* Bert Hardy. ''Down the Bay: Picture Post, Humanist Photography and Images of 1950s Cardiff'' (2003) * Bert Hardy. ''Bert Hardy: My Life'' (The Gordon Fraser Gallery Ltd, London, 1985)


References


Sources

*''Operatic Entrance'', by David J. Marcou, ''Smithsonian'', March 2007, pp. 16–18. * Sue Davies. (1995-07-05)

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...
. Retrieved 2008-04-04. * Ben Campkin. ''Down and Out in London? Photography and the Politics of Representing 'Life in the Elephant', 1948 and 2005'' in Swenarton, M., Troiani, T., Webster, H. (ed.) "The Politics of Making" (AHRA Critiques: Critical Studies in Architectural Humanities series. Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2007), pp. 230–243. . * Graham Harrison. (2008). Photo Histories
''The Life and Times of Albert Hardy (1913–1995)''
Retrieved 2008-06-16.


External links


Photograph of the two young women sitting on railings above the Blackpool promenade



"The Cockney Eye: Bert Hardy(1913–1995), A Neo-Dickensian 'Picture Post' Hero", the online version (La Crosse History Unbound website) of paperback biography about Bert Hardy of 50,000+ words including full-text, endnotes, and photo-illustrations, authored by David Joseph Marcou, and first published by DigiCOPY of La Crosse, WI, in Feb. 2013.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hardy, Bert 1913 births 1995 deaths Photographers from London English photojournalists Photography in Korea War photographers Picture Post photojournalists