Che portrait and other classicsgreenspun.com : LUSENET : Leica Photography : One Thread |
OK, having just bought my first Leica (M6 TTL .72 w/ Lux 35/1.4 ASPH) I have now officially been bitten by the Leica bug. Or is it the Leica trip? I'm new to this world, so forgive me for asking such a banal question:Who made the famous Che Guevera portrait? I know it was taken with a Leica. Cartier-Bresson?
Also, what are your recommendations for Leica books? Not necessarily a monograph, but a good general collection of great Leica M images. I've seen the "75 Years of Leica Photography" volume listed on eBay and wonder if it's a good collection. Any others?
As for periodicals, which do you prefer: World or Fotografie?
I know that my new obsession is going to activate a number of adjunct interests. The study of classic photojournalism is bound to be high on the list. I work for the University of Texas at Austin, which was recently lucky enough to acquire the David Douglas Duncan archives. I plan to lose myself in them over the next year. (Wearing white gloves, of course.) I'll be sure to share some factual nuggets when I find them.
Luke
-- Luke Dunlap (luked@mail.utexas.edu), November 28, 2001
The lateAlberto Diaz Gutierrez Korda, Cuban photographer, with an M2 and 90mm lens.
-- Phil Stiles (stiles@meterocast.net), November 28, 2001.
H C-B did a portrait of Guevara but it may not be the one to which you're referring:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp- srv/style/museums/photogallery/bresson/gal_2-3.htm
-- Ray Moth (ray_moth@yahoo.com), November 28, 2001.
Phil Stiles is correct -- Alberto Korda made the most famous photo of Che, the one you have seen, most likely. As for books, get anything by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Leonard Freed, Ralph Gibson, Jim Marshall...The list is pretty long.
-- Douglas Kinnear (douglas.kinnear@colostate.edu), November 29, 2001.
Luke:The most famous "CHE" portrait was indeed taken by Korda and was recently the subject of a long intellectual property battle in court before he won the right to charge royalties for the commercial use of the image. He died earlier this year, triumphant.
"Must Read" for anyone with Leicas are the works of Sebastiao Salgado, which represent the state of the art in photojournalism, as well as technical achievement with Leicas (mostly Rs but often Ms), Tri X and T MAx 3200 and Very Good printing. The emotional impoact of the photos, contributed to in no small way by the technical magic, sets these apart from virtually all else today.
Leica Fotografie has the occasional good general technical article, but is obviously an advertising vehicle for Leica. Good reproductions but pricey.
I envy you, both for the DDD archives, but also for the great collection of astrophotograhy there. Do you have the originals of the controversial "snapshots" DDD took recently of HCB?
Cheers
-- RICHARD ILOMAKI (richardjx@hotmail.com), November 29, 2001.
Book, I would recommend Mary Ellen Mark's Falkland Road and Depardon's Winterreise. Both less portentous and, I think, more honest than the Salgado stuff - but I won't bore you all with my objections to SS yet again!Of course, they're shot in colour, so it's clothes only, no soul.
-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), November 29, 2001.
Rob, I'll second the vote for "Winterreise" but the photographer is Luc Delahaye. I'll also second your opinions about Salgado. I'll take Josef Koudelka over Salgado any day of the week. Koudelka's a true poet.The recent "Magnum Degrees" book is a good place to start for a collection of great pictures, although they aren't all necessarily made with Leica cameras.
-- Steve Wiley (wiley@accesshub.net), November 29, 2001.
Luke et al:Sorry for not mentioning Kudelka and Renee Buree. They too are greats. There is a show of Gary Winogrands work on somewhere now sorry: I forgot where) and his steet photography with Ms sets the standard for the genre.
It is just I have seen SS's exhibit "Workers" live and in B&W and still use that as a benchmark, 'tho I have seen originals of many others as well. Eisenstein's early work was all with Leicas, and there are books out with his work in them.
A stunningly unique bit of Leica history is a collection of pictures taken in one afternoon in the Warsaw Ghetto by a German soldier who was given a Leica and a few rolls of film as a birthday present. He had access to the ghetto and wandered around for a few hours shooting unhindered. His negs were found, never printed, about 10 years ago and represent the only documentation available of life in that place. I got a copy of it at the Holocost memorial in Jerusalemn, but I am sure 5 minutes on the Internet can find it, or it may well be in the UT@A library.
Regards
-- RICHARD ILOMAKI (richardjx@hotmail.com), November 29, 2001.
I was lucky enough to find a bookstore at an outlet mall here in Florida, (while in a mind numbing coma from waiting for my girlfriend to finish clothes shopping), which had a dozen of David Allen Harvey's book, "CUBA" for $14.99, reduced from the normally $50 due to some unperceivable smudges on the jacket.It you want to see a book featuring Leica photography, this is desirable. Besides the equipment brand choice, almost every image in the book was taken with the same lens that you have listed in your initial question. Just looking at this book might dissuade you from buying another lens for awhile. It is clear that you will have to work long and hard to run out of shots from this useful focal length.
If you haven't seen this book, go to the following site and take a look at some of the images. Being kind of old fashioned, I prefer the actual book to the computer screen, but they are represented well at this site.
DAH's Cuba book
-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), November 29, 2001.
Here's a great site for remaindered photo books:http://www.edwardrhamilton.com/subject1/pg.html
-- Steve Wiley (wiley@accesshub.net), November 29, 2001.