Yousuf Karsh, master photographer of the 20th century
Hot off the scanner today is this beauty of Adolph Gottlieb in his New York studio. Born in 1903, Gottlieb was an American abstract expressionist painter, sculptor and printmaker. In 1963 he became the first American artist to be awarded the Gran Premio of the São Paulo Bienale in Brazil. In 1968, the Guggenheim Museum and the Whitney Museum in New York collaborated on a retrospective exhibition of his art that filled both museums. In between, in 1966, he was photographed by Mr. Karsh.
In 1921, at the age of 39, Franklin Roosevelt contracted a paralytic illness, believed at the time to be polio, and his legs became permanently paralyzed. On this day, January 3, in 1938, Roosevelt founded the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis (March of Dimes), leading to the development of polio vaccines. Roosevelt’s leadership in the March of Dimes is one reason he is commemorated on the American dime. (Wikipedia)
Roosevelt became 32nd president of the United States in 1933.
December 21, 2018, marked 50 years since Apollo 8 launched into space. During this mission, William Anders took the spectacular photograph that came to be known as “Earthrise.” NBC’s TODAY show licensed the above image of Anders for an interview they held with him that aired December 20.
Anders loaded his camera with color film, put on a telephoto lens and started shooting – worrying all the while that he might not get the shot he was looking for. “When I was in high school, I had a 35-millimeter camera with roll-up film in it, and actually tried to develop it a little bit myself, which was usually a failure,” he told Smith. “But, you know, I knew the basics of f-stops and shutter speeds and that kind of thing. Could hardly call myself a photographer.”
Karsh photographed the three Apollo 8 astronauts, William Anders, Frank Borman and Jim Lovell, in April, 1969. (The image is yet to be digitized.)
Library and Archives Canada added many Karsh images to their database this year, including this wintery photo. Photograph taken in Quebec. NFB Photo Story: Annual Ritual in the Woods.
Have a sweet new year, from all of us at the estate of Yousuf Karsh.
Royal Canadian Mint and the Estate of Yousuf Karsh are excited to announce this new limited edition silver coin available for sale as of August 7, 2018. We worked closely together and with the help of our colleagues at the National Archives in Ottawa, Canada, who provided historical information about Mr. Karsh’s work with the British Royals.
It is the image of grace, dignity, and poise. Taken at Clarence House in London, the 1951 portrait of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (then Princess Elizabeth) by Armenian-Canadian photographer Yousuf Karsh (1908-2002) shows a youthful princess on the eve of a royal visit to Canada and on the cusp of history, for she would succeed to the throne less than seven months later. As a special tribute, your 10 oz. coin is the largest portrait of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II to ever appear on one of our coins. Karsh’s original photograph is expertly reproduced in exquisite detail on the engraved reverse, where multiple finishes mimic the interplay between light and shadow that is synonymous with portraits by “Karsh of Ottawa,” who is widely acclaimed as one of the greatest portrait photographers of the 20th century.
The packaging alone is exquisite, the coin itself is breathtaking.
Read more about Mr. Karsh, Princess Elizabeth, and order your coin!
Nobel Prizes are generally awarded today, December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death (in 1896). In 1938, Pearl Buck became the first American woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature “for her rich and truly epic descriptions of peasant life in China and for her biographical masterpieces.” NobelPrize.org.
Of course, Mr. Karsh photographed many Nobel Prize winners including the first African-American winner, Dr. Ralph J. Bunche, a professor of government at Harvard University who won the Peace Prize. See information about the Nobel Sittings.
The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery’s exhibition “Yousuf Karsh: American Portraits” has arrived in Florida. The Lowe Art Museum in Coral Gables is hosting the show from now through January 20, 2019. The 48 Karsh portraits on view include First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, Humphrey Bogart, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jonas Salk, Marian Anderson, Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Arden, and I. M. Pei.
There is a wonderful review by Farah Nayeri in the New York Times :
“Not everyone in Britain is familiar with the name Yousuf Karsh. Yet just about everyone in Britain has carried his most celebrated image around in their pocket, wallet or purse. Mr. Karsh was a portrait photographer who in 1941 took what became the most famous picture of Prime Minister Winston Churchill: the one where he stands, hand on hip, glaring at the lens – and the one that appears on Britain’s 5-pound note. It was taken while Churchill was in Canada, during an improvised shoot.” Read the rest of the article.
On January 6, 1982, Yousuf Karsh photographed George H. W. Bush, Vice President of the United States at the time. Also present, and to be photographed, was Bush’s dear friend and colleague, James Baker, the White House Chief of Staff. When George Bush died last week, it was James Baker who was by his side. The New York Times covers their very close relationship in “I Love You, Too’: George Bush’s Final Days”
The Karsh archives are packed full of correspondence between Karsh and his subjects. Here is an insight into the communications that went on around the sitting, between Bush, Baker, and Bush’s personal photographer, Cynthia Johnson. We hope to share Johnson’s photographs of the three together soon.
See portraits of James Baker and George H. W. Bush
Here are some of the letters and notecards:
George Herbert Walker Bush has died.
Bush served as the 41st President of the United States from 1989 to 1993. He had served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States from 1981 to 1989. As a member of the Republican Party, he had previously been a Representative, Ambassador and Director of Central Intelligence Agency.
On this day, November 29, in 1967, Robert S. McNamara announced that he would resign as Secretary of Defense and become president of the World Bank, where he would remain until 1981.
McNamara served from 1961 to 1968 under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. In 1960, he had become the first president of Ford Motor Company from outside the Ford family.
After his election in 1960, President-elect John F. Kennedy first offered the post of Secretary of Defense to former secretary Robert A. Lovett; Lovett declined but recommended McNamara. Kennedy then sent Sargent Shriver to approach McNamara regarding either the Treasury or the Defense cabinet post less than five weeks after McNamara had become president at Ford. McNamara immediately rejected the Treasury position but eventually accepted Kennedy’s invitation to serve as Secretary of Defense. (Wikipedia)
See portraits of John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Sargent Shriver.
See Sittings related to Ford Motor Company.
Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor, Viscountess Astor, was the first female Member of Parliament to take her seat, winning a by-election on November 28, 1919. Astor was an American citizen who moved to England at age 26, where she married American-born Englishman Waldorf Astor. After he succeeded to the peerage and entered the House of Lords, she entered politics, and in 1919 she won his former seat in Plymouth and became the first woman to sit as a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons.
Viscountess Astor was photographed by Yousuf Karsh in 1946, one year after she was “persuaded to retire.” Read about her fascinating life.
The enormously successful “Living Modern” exhibition continues its travels. It is now showing at the Cleveland Museum of Art until March 3, 2018. Three portraits of Georgia O’Keeffe by Yousuf Karsh are included in the exhibition, alongside portraits of O’Keeffe by Alfred Stieglitz, her lover and husband, and by Ansel Adams, Bruce Weber and Andy Warhol.
Steven Litt, writing for the Cleveland Plain Dealer:
… O’Keeffe later posed for widely published photographic portraits that broadcast her cultural presence as an icon of independence and self-determination. One such picture is Yousuf Karsh’s magnificent 1956 image of O’Keeffe in the walled adobe compound where she lived in the northern New Mexico village of Abiquiu.
Wearing a black suit, the artist sits on a low bench under a deer’s skull and antlers suspended on the wall overhead like a protective totem. Reflected light from an open doorway at the right etches the artist’s profile against the shadowy interior.
Such pictures – which O’Keeffe helped create in full collaboration with visiting photographers – helped her attain secular sainthood as a high priestess of modernism. Read all of Mr. Litt’s review of the exhibition.
From the time of the Founding Fathers until the time of Lincoln, the date Thanksgiving was observed varied from state to state. The final Thursday in November had become the customary date in most U.S. states by the beginning of the 19th century.
According to Wikipedia, modern Thanksgiving was first officially called for in all states in 1863 by a presidential proclamation of Abraham Lincoln. Influenced by the campaigning of author Sarah Joseph Hale, who wrote letters to politicians for around 40 years trying to make it an official holiday, Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving on the final Thursday in November, explicitly in celebration of the bounties that had continued to fall on the Union and for the military successes in the war. Because of the ongoing Civil War, a nationwide Thanksgiving date was not realized until Reconstruction was completed in the 1870s. On October 31, 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a presidential proclamation changing the holiday to the next to last Thursday in November, for business reasons.
In the image above, we see Roosevelt three years prior, in 1936, with Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King. Thanksgiving Day in Canada was celebrated on November 6 until World War I ended and the Armistice Day holiday was usually held during the same week. To prevent the two holidays from clashing with one another, in 1957 the Canadian Parliament proclaimed Thanksgiving to be observed on its present date on the second Monday of October.
On this day, November 20, in 1947, Princess Elizabeth married Philip Mountbatten at Westminster Abbey in London. Karsh had photographed Her Royal Highness Princess Elizabeth in 1943 when she was just 17; he photographed her alone, and with Philip and their young family, in 1951; and on three additional occasions, in 1966, 1984, and 1987. See more about these Sittings.
The Women’s Lunch Place in Boston offers a safe haven for homeless women, providing not only food, but assistance with employment and housing, as well as self-help and creative classes. Women’s Lunch Place treats vulnerable women with dignity, and empowers them to pursue their dreams.
Earlier this month Estrellita Karsh unveiled two paintings by artist Nan Freeman which will hang permanently at the shelter.
The 12 bouquets are a floral celebration representing the 12 months of the year, inspired by our monthly birthday celebrations. These beautiful paintings are a gift from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Karsh Center, and will hang in the shelter bringing joy, reflection and inspiration to our guests and anyone who visits the WLP community!
Today, November 14, is His Royal Highness Prince Charles’ 70th birthday. Among the many birthday celebrations taking place in his honor, the Channel island of Jersey has released a series of commemorative stamps. A portrait by Karsh is seen here top right, showing Charles in 1975 when he was photographed at Government House, Ottawa.
Karsh had photographed Charles as a little boy, in 1951. Learn more about the Royals.
At the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the First World War ended, with Germany signing an armistice agreement with the Allies.
McNaughton joined the Canadian militia in 1909. He took the 4th Battery of the Canadian Expeditionary Force overseas with the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 and arrived in France in February 1915. The need to accurately pinpoint artillery targets, both stationary and moving, led to his invention of a target detection technique using an oscilloscope which was the forerunner of radar. He sold the rights to that invention to the Government of Canada for only $10.
In March 1916 he was promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel and returned to England to take command of the newly arrived 11 (Howitzer) Brigade RCA, taking it to France in July. In early 1917 he was appointed the Counter Battery Staff Officer of the Canadian Corps. On the day before the armistice he was promoted to Brigadier-General and appointed General Officer Commanding Canadian Corps Heavy Artillery. (Wikipedia)
Wonderful portrait; wonderful story:
The founder of Canada’s modern army… (General Andrew McNaughton) came to my studio in Ottawa, during a short leave following a long and tedious tour of duty in Britain. He was so tense that it was difficult to find a good angle from which to take him. Thinking that it might prove relaxing, I suggested that he try walking up and down. Ever since, I’ve been accused of exhausting the General by putting him through a campaign route march. However, I was able to catch this picture during one of his halts, and, in certain ways, I consider it one of the most successful I have ever made. While it certainly doesn’t look as if I had succeeded in getting him relaxed, it does reflect the anxiety and seriousness of the moment, and was widely used for posters and recruiting purposes. McNaughton had interrupted important scientific work to don the uniform again, and create an army out of almost nothing. He was to know no rest or relaxation until his unwelcome task would be turned over to a younger man. I was glad to be able to show his absorption in the emergency of his job so clearly.
In the early 1950’s, Karsh accepted several assignments of industrial workers which was a brief but highly satisfying adventure in photojournalism. One of those assignments was for Ford of Canada. Pictured here is Gow Crapper, a Ford worker looking like a Hollywood movie star. Thanks to Mr. Crapper’s family for reaching out to us recently.
Crapper features on the cover of the book Industrial Images (The Art Gallery of Windsor, 2007) in which Karsh notes: “I had never taken my camera into an industrial plant. Now I was not only to take my camera there but was to work for many days amid the smoke, fire and dust… The men in such an environment daily go about their works almost casually. They work swiftly and efficiently to accomplish precise tasks of great exactness.”
We are regularly adding images to our digital archives. This portrait of German-French painter Hans Hartung is fresh from the scanner. As can perhaps be inferred from the view, M. Hartung was photographed in France. Born in Germany, Hartung moved to Paris in the late 1920s.
He was rejected from Nazi Germany on account of being a ‘degenerate’, because his painting style was associated with Cubism – an art movement incompatible with Nazi Germany’s ideals. In 1935 when he attempted to sell paintings while visiting Berlin, the police tried to arrest him. He was able to flee the country. In December 1939, he became a member of the French Foreign Legion. He was closely followed by the Gestapo and arrested for seven months by the French police. After they learned he was a painter, he was put in a red cell in an attempt to disturb his vision. (Read more on Wikipedia)
A new “uncirculated” £5 coin was released in the United Kingdom to celebrate the 65th anniversary of The Queen’s Coronation.
“A royal year of celebration in 2018 continues with a very important anniversary. Having become our longest reigning monarch in 2015 and celebrating her 90th birthday in 2016, the remarkable reign of Her Majesty The Queen presents another historic milestone as we mark the 65th anniversary of her coronation.
“Queen Elizabeth II is the first British monarch to reach such a milestone, and the occasion demands a fitting celebration. Two designs and a limited edition range of coins have been created especially for the occasion, available in versions from a Brilliant Uncirculated £5 coin to a gold Proof kilo coin.”
It came to our attention that this photograph of Marshall McLuhan is the inspiration for someone’s Halloween costume this year. Mr. Karsh’s portraits continue to influence the public. Happy Halloween!
We work closely with our colleagues at National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution. The NPG received a major gift to its collection of more than 100 Karsh portraits in 2012 and due to the popularity of the work they use the images for various promotions and products. This year they will update their National Portrait Gallery/Smithsonian American Art Museum Commemorative Guide featuring important works from their collection, and include this portrait of Muhammad Ali.
Read more about the Karsh collection at National Portrait Gallery.
John Glenn returned to space on October 29, 1998, as a payload specialist on Space Shuttle Discovery, nearly four decades after he became the first American to orbit the Earth.
In 1995, Glenn was reading Space Physiology and Medicine, a book written by NASA doctors. He realized that many changes that occur to physical attributes during space flight, such as loss of bone and muscle mass and blood plasma, are the same as changes that occur due to aging. Glenn thought NASA should send an older person on a shuttle mission, and thought that it should be him. Starting in 1995, he began lobbying NASA director Dan Goldin for the mission. Goldin said he would consider it if there was a scientific reason, and if Glenn could pass the same physical examination the younger astronauts took. Glenn performed research on the subject, and passed the physical examination. On January 16, 1998, NASA Administrator Dan Goldin announced that Glenn would be part of the STS-95 crew; this made him, at age 77, the oldest person to fly in space. (Wikipedia)
Colonel John Glenn was photographed by Karsh at the Manned Spacecraft Center in New York. See more.
Tickets are now available for a recital of Benjamin Britten’s “War Requiem” at Salisbury Cathedral in England. The event takes place on the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day, November 11, which marked the end of hostilities on the Western Front of World War I. Karsh’s portrait of Britten proudly illustrates the program for the event. Book a ticket.
See a portrait of Britten with his dachshund.
Learn about Britten’s Requiem.
Andrew Robert’s new book “Churchill: Walking with Destiny” (Viking) is out next week.
“In this landmark biography of Winston Churchill based on extensive new material, the true genius of the man, statesman and leader can finally be fully seen and understood.
“Roberts gained exclusive access to extensive new material: transcripts of War Cabinet meetings, diaries, letters and unpublished memoirs from Churchill’s contemporaries. The Royal Family permitted Roberts – in a first for a Churchill biographer – to read the detailed notes taken by King George VI in his diary after his weekly meetings with Churchill during World War II. This treasure trove of access allows Roberts to understand the man in revelatory new ways, and to identify the hidden forces fueling Churchill’s legendary drive.”
Watch Karsh recreate this famous portrait, with Morley Safer standing in for Churchill.
Jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie was born on this day, October 21, in 1917. His father was a bandleader, and Dizzy began playing music at four years old.
Gillespie was a trumpet virtuoso and improviser, building on the virtuoso style of Roy Eldridge but adding layers of harmonic and rhythmic complexity previously unheard in jazz. His combination of musicianship, showmanship, and wit made him a leading popularizer of the new music called bebop. His beret and horn-rimmed spectacles, his scat singing, his bent horn, pouched cheeks and his light-hearted personality provided some of bebop’s most prominent symbols. (Wikipedia)
In 1953 Gillespie threw a party for his wife Lorraine at Snookie’s, a club in Manhattan. His trumpet’s bell got bent upward in an accident, but he liked the sound so much he had a special trumpet made with a 45 degree raised bell, which would become his trademark.
Exciting to see a very 21st century application applied to this Karsh portrait of Princess Elizabeth from 1951. Our friends at the Canada Mint will be using this graphic in promoting their fabulous new sterling silver limited edition coin.
Choreographer and director Jerome Robbins was born on October 11, in 1918, making this his centenary year. The New York Public Library has just opened an exhibition titled “Voice of My City” which traces Robbins’ life and dances alongside the history of New York. In its review, New York’s local news WNYC says: “The exhibit is organized around the theme of Robbins’ complicated identities as a ballet and Broadway man, a Jew, a gay man, an outsider and an insider, and someone fascinated by youth culture and by the life of the city.”
“Voice of My City” is on now through March 30th, 2019.
Jean-Paul Riopelle was born on this day, October 7, in 1923. Riopelle was arguably one of the most important Canadian artists of the 20th century, establishing his reputation in the burgeoning postwar art scene of Paris, where his entourage included André Breton, Sam Francis and Samuel Beckett. Riopelle produced over six thousand works during the course of his lifetime. He was born and studied in Montreal but moved to Paris in the 1940s, spending more time back in Canada by the end of the 60s. In 1969 he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada, an honor he shares with Mr. Karsh.
Seventy-one years ago on October 5, President Harry Truman gave the first ever televised presidential address from the White House. There were fewer than 50,000 television sets in US households. On October 3, 2018, as many as 225,000,000 Americans with a cell phone received a text message from the current President.
In this quarter’s issue of The New Atlantis, contributing editor Algis Valiunas writes about Jonas Salk, using our portrait to illustrate. Salk discovered and developed one of the first successful polio vaccines.
At the age of forty, Jonas Salk became the most beloved scientist in America. He was probably the most beloved scientist the world has ever seen. Einstein may have been more famous, but very few understood what he had done. He was much loved, but in the way hobbits or leprechauns are loved, fancifully, as a bearer of benign, alien magic. J. Robert Oppenheimer was as famous as Salk, and millions were grateful for what he did, yet his achievement also made him notorious — downright malignant in the eyes of many, the malignancy growing as the monstrosity of Imperial Japan has receded from public memory. But everyone knew and understood what Jonas Salk had done with the vaccine for paralytic poliomyelitis that bears his name, and everyone loved him for it unreservedly, with the exception of a good many other scientists, who were grossly outnumbered by the adoring multitude.
Read more and subscribe to The New Atlantis for the full extensive article.
James “Jimmy” Carter was born on this day, October 1, in 1924. Unlike several other US Presidents, James Carter was photographed by Karsh only once, while he was President but not during any of his other political tenures as senator or governor. Carter is currently the earliest-serving living former U.S. President.
French-Armenian singer, lyricist, actor, public activist and diplomat Charles Aznavour died this week, leaving behind more than 1,200 songs, and sales of 180 million records. Yousuf Karsh photographed Aznavour in Ottawa in 1987.
Read more about his extraordinary life (Wikipedia).
J. Paul Getty is pictured at home in England, in 1964. In the background hangs Diana and her Nymphs on the Hunt, which is today in the J. Paul Getty Museum’s collection, attributed to the Workshop of Peter Paul Rubens.
A photograph from this sitting will accompany an essay based on a lecture organized by the Frick Collection in New York on the broader topic of the history of collecting Flemish baroque paintings in the United States.
Click here to see the lectures from the symposium America and the Art of Flanders: Collecting Paintings by Rubens, Van Dyck, and Their Circles.
Slow Burn is the new podcast released by Slate that covers the Clinton years, his affair with Monica Lewinsky, and how the Republican party coalesced around his impeachment. In one episode, Bill Clinton is compared to Ronald Reagan who apparently always wore a jacket to enter the Oval Office, whereas Clinton likely took his off. Clinton’s liaisons got him into serious trouble, it seems tolerance for indiscretion has increased enormously in the last 25 years.
On this day, September 20, 1973, Billie Jean King beat Bobby Riggs in a highly publicized “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match. The match was held at the Houston Astrodome, between 55-year-old Bobby Riggs and 29-year-old Billie Jean King. She won in three sets.
The match was viewed by an estimated 90 million people around the world. King felt the weight of women’s rights on her shoulders, saying “I thought it would set us back 50 years if I didn’t win that match. It would ruin the women’s tour and affect all women’s self-esteem.” Read more (Wikipedia)
Ms. King was photographed by Karsh in West Hollywood in 1991.
Britain’s BBC TV is now airing the 10 part series “Trust”, starring Donald Sutherland as J. Paul Getty, the billionaire oil baron whose grandson and heir to his fortune, John Paul Getty III, is kidnapped. The series aired on the American channel FX earlier this year.
The Sutherland/Getty resemblance is uncanny!
Thanks to social media, we sometimes discover gems new to the Estate. This lovely photograph of Audrey Hepburn and Mel Ferrer being photographed by Yousuf Karsh in 1956 is a perfect example. MPTV Images were generous to share their digital copy, which will be added to the Life in Images gallery on this website.
“Chagall: Stories into Dreams” opens on September 28, 2018, at the Polk Museum of Art in Lakeland, Florida. “This extraordinary show of Marc Chagall’s work will be the only one of its kind in Florida and the only one in the country that pairs his Fables of La Fontaine etchings (1952) with his Story of Exodus lithographs (1966).”
Karsh’s 1965 portrait of Chagall graces the invitation for a salon-style gathering and tour of the exhibition taking place on October 15th. Read more.
This week the United States will seat a new supreme court justice. Yousuf Karsh photographed several North American justices, from the 1930s to the 1970s, as you can see from this long list.
For example, Earl Warren, who served as Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1953-1969, where he oversaw groundbreaking decisions including banning segregation in public schools. He was later appointed to chair what became known as the Warren Commission, which was formed to investigate the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Warren is the last Supreme Court justice to have served as governor of a U.S. state, the last justice to have been elected to statewide elected office, and the last serving politician to be elevated to the Supreme Court. (Wikipedia)
This portrait features on the cover of the The Warren Court (Macmillan Books, 1964).