James Augustus Van Der Zee (June 29, 1886 – May 15, 1983) was an American photographer best known for his portraits of

black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white ...

New Yorker New Yorker or ''variant'' primarily refers to: * A resident of the State of New York ** Demographics of New York (state) * A resident of New York City ** List of people from New York City * ''The New Yorker'', a magazine founded in 1925 * '' The ...

s. He was a leading figure in the Harlem Renaissance. Aside from the artistic merits of his work, Van Der Zee produced the most comprehensive documentation of the period. Among his most famous subjects during this time were

Marcus Garvey Marcus Mosiah Garvey Sr. (17 August 188710 June 1940) was a Jamaican political activist, publisher, journalist, entrepreneur, and orator. He was the founder and first President-General of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African ...

Bill "Bojangles" Robinson Bill Robinson, nicknamed Bojangles (born Luther Robinson; May 25, 1878 – November 25, 1949), was an American tap dancer, actor, and singer, the best known and the most highly paid African-American entertainer in the United States during the f ...

and

Countee Cullen Countee Cullen (born Countee LeRoy Porter; May 30, 1903 – January 9, 1946) was an American poet, novelist, children's writer, and playwright, particularly well known during the Harlem Renaissance. Early life Childhood Countee LeRoy Porter ...

Biography

Born in Lenox, Massachusetts, Van Der Zee demonstrated an early gift for music, and was initially aspired to career as a professional violinist. Van Der Zee's second interest was in photography. He bought his first camera when he was a teenager, and improvised a darkroom in his parents' home. He took hundreds of photographs of his family as well as his hometown of Lenox. Van Der Zee was one of the first people to provide an early documentation of his community life in small town New England. In 1906, he moved with his father and brother to

Harlem Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and Central Park North on the south. The greater Ha ...

in New York City, where he worked as a waiter and

elevator operator An elevator operator (North American English), liftman (in Commonwealth English, usually lift attendant), or lift girl (in British English), is a person specifically employed to operate a manually operated elevator. Description Being an effec ...

. By now Van Der Zee was a skilled pianist and aspiring professional violinist. He would become the primary creator and one of the five performers in a group known as the Harlem Orchestra. In March 1907, Van Der Zee married Kate L. Brown and they moved back to Lenox to have their daughter, Rachel, born in September. Soon after, they moved to

Phoebus, Virginia Phoebus (known as Chesapeake City from 1871-1899) is a formerly incorporated town located in Elizabeth City County on the Virginia Peninsula in eastern Virginia. Upon incorporation in 1900, it was named in honor of local businessman Harrison Phoeb ...

. In 1908, their son, Emile, was born but died within a year from

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 severi ...

. In 1915, he moved to

Newark, New Jersey Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area.portraitist 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 this re ...

. That same year, he converted to

Catholicism The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

and began taking assignments from the Church. He returned to Harlem the following year, just as large numbers of Black immigrants and migrants were arriving into that part of the city. He set up a studio at the Toussaint Conservatory of Art and Music with his sister, Jennie Louise Van Der Zee, also known as Madame E Toussaint, who had founded the conservatory in 1911.

In 1916, Van Der Zee and Gaynella Greenlee launched the Guarantee Photo Studio on West 125th Street in Harlem. They married in 1918. His business boomed during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, and the portraits he shot from this period until 1945 have demanded the majority of critical attention. In 1919, he photographed the victory parade of the returning 369th Infantry Regiment, a predominantly African American unit sometimes called the "Harlem Hellfighters." Evening Attire

During the height of his popularity in 1927, his daughter Rachel, aged 19, died of

appendicitis Appendicitis is inflammation of the appendix. Symptoms commonly include right lower abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, and decreased appetite. However, approximately 40% of people do not have these typical symptoms. Severe complications of a ru ...

while in

Portland, Maine Portland is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maine and the seat of Cumberland County. Portland's population was 68,408 in April 2020. The Greater Portland metropolitan area is home to over half a million people, the 104th-largest metropo ...

. Van Der Zee photographed her funeral; he incorporated poems and heavenly imagery into the final prints. During the 1920s and 1930s, he produced hundreds of photographs recording Harlem's growing middle class. Its residents entrusted the visual documentation of their weddings, funerals, celebrities and sports stars, and social life to his carefully composed images. Quickly Van Der Zee became the most successful photographer in Harlem. Among his many renowned subjects were poet

, dancer Bill ("Bojangles") Robinson, Charles M. "Daddy" Grace, Joe Louis,

Florence Mills Florence Mills (born Florence Winfrey; January 25, 1896 – November 1, 1927), billed as the "Queen of Happiness", was an American cabaret singer, dancer, and comedian. Life and career Florence Mills (Florence Winfrey) was born a daughter of for ...

, and

black nationalist Black nationalism is a type of racial nationalism or pan-nationalism which espouses the belief that black people are a race, and which seeks to develop and maintain a black racial and national identity. Black nationalist activism revolves aro ...

leader

. By the early 1930s Van Der Zee found it harder to make an income from his work in photography, partly because of the strained economic circumstances of many of his customers and partly because the growing popularity of personal cameras reduced the need for professional photography. Van Der Zee worked predominantly in the studio and used a variety of props, including architectural elements, backdrops, and costumes, to achieve stylized

tableaux vivant A (; often shortened to ; plural: ), French for "living picture", is a static scene containing one or more actors or models. They are stationary and silent, usually in costume, carefully posed, with props and/or scenery, and may be theatric ...

in keeping with late Victorian and

Edwardian The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history spanned the reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victori ...

visual traditions. Sitters often copied celebrities of the 1920s and 1930s in their poses and expressions, and he retouched negatives and prints heavily to achieve an aura of glamour. He also created funeral photographs between the wars. These works were later collected in ''The Harlem Book of the Dead'' (1978), with a foreword by

Toni Morrison Chloe Anthony Wofford Morrison (born Chloe Ardelia Wofford; February 18, 1931 – August 5, 2019), known as Toni Morrison, was an American novelist. Her first novel, ''The Bluest Eye'', was published in 1970. The critically acclaimed '' So ...

. In 1982, at age 96, Van Der Zee photographed 21-year-old painter Jean-Michel Basquiat for the January 1983 issue of ''Interview'' magazine. Van Der Zee died in Washington, D.C. on May 15, 1983. Ten years later the National Portrait Gallery exhibited his work as a posthumous tribute. In 1984 Van Der Zee was inducted into the

International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum The International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum in St. Louis, Missouri honors those who have made great contributions to the field of photography. History In 1977 the first Hall of Fame and Museum opened in Santa Barbara, California and a f ...

Works

Commission from UNIA

In the spring and summer of 1924, Van Der Zee worked to document the members and activities of

Universal Negro Improvement Association The Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL) is a black nationalist fraternal organization founded by Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican immigrant to the United States, and Amy Ashwood Garvey. The Pan-Africa ...

(UNIA). He took thousands of photographs on this assignment, some of which were featured in a calendar issued to members in 1925. Fulfilling Garvey's wishes, Van Der Zee's job was to project a positive image of the Association, especially to emphasize the strength and social standing of its membership, the so-called Garveyites. Nowhere in Van Der Zee's visual record was there any hint of the controversy surrounding Garvey in the early 1920s, a period when the leader was subject to public interrogation, quarrels with the writer and philosopher W.E.B. DuBois, and legal proceedings against him on charges of mail fraud.

''Harlem on My Mind''

In 1969, Van Der Zee gained worldwide recognition when his work was featured in the exhibition ''Harlem on My Mind'' at the

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 ...

in New York. His inclusion in the exhibition was somewhat by accident. In December 1967, a researcher for the exhibition (and a photographer in his own right), Reginald McGhee, came across Van Der Zee's Harlem studio and asked if he happened to have any photographs from the 1920s and 30s. In a story recounted by photo historian Rodger C. Birt, Van Der Zee showed him the boxes and boxes of negatives he had kept from this period. These photographs would become the core of ''Harlem on My Mind''—and the feature of the exhibit that critics routinely praised as the show's biggest revelation. As art historian Sharon Patton observed, Van Der Zee not only documented the Harlem Renaissance, but also helped create it. ''Harlem on My Mind'' marked a controversy between the Met and a number of practicing artists then living and working and Harlem. Painters including

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and

Benny Andrews Benny Andrews (November 13, 1930 – November 10, 2006) was an African-American artist, activist and educator. Born in Plainview, Georgia, Andrews earned a BFA in painting from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1958, and soon after m ...

protested the show for its emphasis on social history and experience, at the expense—as they viewed it—of interest in the artistic legacy of black New York artists. On opening day, a picket line formed in front of the Met. Andrews carried a sign reading: "Visit The Metropolitan Museum of Photography."

Photographic techniques and artistry

Works by Van Der Zee are artistic as well as technically proficient. His work was in high demand, in part due to his experimentation and skill in double exposures and in retouching negatives of children. One theme that recurs in his photographs was the emergent

black middle class The African-American middle class consists of African-Americans who have middle-class status within the American class structure. It is a societal level within the African-American community that primarily began to develop in the early 1960s, ...

, which he captured using traditional techniques in often idealistic images. Negatives were retouched to show glamor and an aura of perfection. This affected the likeness of the person photographed, but he felt each photo should transcend the subject. His carefully posed family portraits reveal that the family unit was an important aspect of Van Der Zee's life. "I tried to see that every picture was better-looking than the person ... I had one woman come to me and say 'Mr. VanDerZee my friends tell that's a nice picture, but it doesn't look like you.' That was my style", said VanDerZee. Van Der Zee sometimes combined several photos in one image, for example by adding a ghostly child to an image of a wedding to suggest the couple's future, or by superimposing a funeral image upon a photograph of a dead woman to give the feeling of her eerie presence. Van Der Zee said, "I wanted to make the camera take what I thought should be there." Van Der Zee was a working photographer who supported himself through portraiture, and he devoted time to his professional work before his more artistic compositions. Many famous residents of Harlem were among his subjects. In addition to portraits, Van Der Zee photographed organizations, events, and other businesses.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions

* 1970: Lenox Library, Massachusetts * 1971: Studio Museum in Harlem, New York * 1974: Lunn Gallery/Graphics International, Washington, D.C. * 1979: ''The Legacy of James Van Der Zee: A Portrait of Black Americans'', Alternative Center for International Arts, New York and Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington * 1983: Camera Club of New York and Idaho State University, Pocatello * 1987: Deborah Sharp Gallery, New York * 1994: Retrospective, National Portrait Gallery Washington, D.C. and Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York

Selected group exhibitions

* 1969: ''Harlem on My Mind: Cultural Capital of Black America 1900–1968'', Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York * 1978: Lunn Gallery, Washington, D.C. * 1979: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and ''Fleeting Gestures: Dance Photographs'', International Center of Photography, New York (traveling) * 1982: Rheinisches Landesmuseum, Bonn, Germany * 1985: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art * 1987: Studio Museum in Harlem, New York (traveling)

Publications

* *

References

External links

Van Der Zee at Biography.com

James Van Der Zee in the Minneapolis Institute of Art
Minneapolis, MN {{DEFAULTSORT:Van Der Zee, James 1886 births 1983 deaths Photographers from New York City African-American photographers People from Lenox, Massachusetts Harlem Renaissance American portrait photographers 20th-century American photographers 20th-century American male artists Photographers from Massachusetts 20th-century African-American artists African-American Catholics