Join legendary photographer, Joel Meyerowitz, as he sits down with host Hugh Brownstone to share how he thinks about a photographer’s oeuvre – and in the pro…
Join legendary photographer, Joel Meyerowitz, as he sits down with host Hugh Brownstone to share how he thinks about a photographer’s oeuvre – and in the process learn more about Joel’s own life’s journey.
“There is a dawning awareness that you feel good in this place. Something here makes you attentive, brings you to an awakened state. But you can’t know that beforehand.”
Interview by Constance Sullivan, from Creating A Sense of Place, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1990
CS: Why do you choose to ph
I went because I was undergoing some changes in my life in terms of questions I was asking about photography, and there were certain things I had to give up, and I had to be ruthless about it. In order to do that I had to work away from New York City for a while. I knew that the time and work that a view camera required did not allow me to work in a big city in the same way that I had worked with a 35mm camera. So I had to abandon that notion completely and take myself to a place where life was simple, where life moved more slowly, where there was a chance to use this tool and to see differently. I had no idea what it was going to look like. I even kidded myself thinking I would go to Provincetown and work on the street, because it was busy, but smaller, I thought it was manageable. I hardly made any pictures on the street. Everything else seemed to call to me. And I believe these things are related in part to the instrument we choose to work with. An 8 x 10 camera isn’t for horse races. You do what it tells you to do.
For the past five decades, the American photographer Joel Meyerowitz has roamed the streets of the world, countrysides and beaches in search of life in blue, green, yellow and red. In the 1970s, his sense of modernism contributed to accept color photographs as works of art.
He chased parades, ambushed hairdressers and refused to leave Ground Zero. Over PG Tips and ricotta at his Tuscan barn, Joel Meyerowitz relives his most stunning shots
He chased parades, ambushed hairdressers and refused to leave Ground Zero. Over PG Tips and ricotta at his Tuscan barn, Joel Meyerowitz relives his most stunning shots
“Joel Meyerowitz: Where I Find Myself, published by Laurence King in March 2018 is the first major single book retrospective of one of the world’s most influential photographers, Joel Meyerowitz. This timely new book, published to coincide with the photog
“Joel Meyerowitz: Where I Find Myself, published by Laurence King in March 2018 is the first major single book retrospective of one of the world’s most influential photographers, Joel Meyerowitz. This timely new book, published to coincide with the photographer’s 80th birthday, spans Meyerowitz’s whole career in reverse chronological order, including his harrowing coverage of Ground Zero and his iconic street photography work.” (From the book press release)
Bay/Sky, Provincetown, Massachusetts, 1987. New York City, 1975. Joel Meyerowitz: Where I Find Myself (Laurence King) is a pièce de résistance, a masterful feat of publishing that sets the bar…
Joel Meyerowitz: Where I Find Myself (Laurence King) is a pièce de résistance, a masterful feat of publishing that sets the bar as high as it can possibly reach. The photographer’s magnum opus opens in the present day, with his most recent body of work and unfolds in reverse chronological order, leading us through a spellbinding life in photography that is simply unparalleled.
1. Now wait a second, is this magic? Or has it all been carefully arranged with actors, lighting and special effects? The truth is more surprising: It’s neither. It’s simply a picture snapped by Joel Meyerowitz on a New York City street one day in 1975. No faces are immediately evident, just figures in camel-colored coats turned away from us, a puff of smoke with two people suspended in it. No, four people, if you count those shadows, six if you count the backs on which the shadows fall. In fact there are seven people, if we count the additional shadow in the foreground, the photographer’s — and further figures emerge as the eye adjusts to the deep background. It is a picture that just won’t sit still.
In 1994, legendary street photographer Joel Meyerowitz and photo historian Colin Westerbeck co-authored a street photography tome, Bystander, which has since become an unofficial bible of the genre. This November, the pair release a fully revised edition that takes into account significant updates to the story of street photography.
Here’s an inspiring 5-minute video in which renowned street photographer Joel Meyerowitz talks about his approach and mindset to making photos. Meyerowitz
Meyerowitz believes that being aware of what’s going on outside the frame lines of your shot is just as important as knowing what’s inside your shot. Instead of photographing a singular object in the world, his aim is to capture the relationship between things — objects both inside his frame and outside of it.
Photographer Meryl Meisler has a lot going on. She recently published A Tale of Two Cities: Disco Era Bushwick to much acclaim and will soon be launching a new book, Purgatory & Paradise: Sassy ‘70s Suburbia & The City at the Bushwick Open Studios at The Black Box Gallery in June 2015. Today I feature work from A Tale of Two Cities, a project that highlights New York in the 1970′s and focuses on two cities existing in very different realities.
Twenty years after its original publication in 1994, Joel Meyerowitz and Colin Westerbeck are working on a new edition of Bystander to be released hopefully in 2015. I asked Joel a few questions about the new edition.
Capturing the quintessential perfect moment in uncontrolled, public settings depends on a magical confluence of elements that suddenly, momentarily, match up so exquisitely they seem choreographed. For the masterful photographer Joel Meyerowitz, these mom
For the masterful photographer Joel Meyerowitz, these moments decorate the massive pantheon of his work like confetti—so ridiculously plentiful that it starts to seem like an easy thing to capture
Third and final part of the interview that Leica Akademie Italy has made with Joel Meyerowitz in Milan. The american master talks about the Leica S medium format camera, and how this camera is capable of delivering an image quality that he was formerly ab
Third and final part of the interview that Leica Akademie Italy has made with Joel Meyerowitz in Milan. The american master talks about the Leica S medium format camera, and how this camera is capable of delivering an image quality that he was formerly able to achieve only with his beloved 8×10″ Deardorff.
Why is it that some photographers take to the studio, while others take to the street? Is street photography photojournalism, art — or both?
These are some of the questions raised by Everybody Street, a new documentary chronicling the life and work of 13 of New York’s most renowned street photographers, including Joel Meyerowitz, Bruce Gilden, Mary Ellen Mark, Elliot Erwitt, Jeff Mermelstein, Boogie and Martha Cooper
Second part of the interview that Leica Akademie Italy has made with Joel Meyerowitz in Milan, in which the American master talks about the Leica M, a camera that has been his tool of choice for street photography in the ’60 and ’70, and that today is his
Second part of the interview that Leica Akademie Italy has made with Joel Meyerowitz in Milan, in which the American master talks about the Leica M, a camera that has been his tool of choice for street photography in the ’60 and ’70, and that today is his companion for daily shooting.
Leica Akademie Italy has met Joel Meyerowitz, soon after the opening of his latest exhibition in Milan, and interviewed him about his life long “love” for Leica cameras, from the first Leica M2 in the sixties to the Leica M9, M and S today. In this first take Meyerowitz talks about a camera that has positively surprised him a lot: the new Leica XVario…
We had 18-year-old up-and-coming photographer Olivia Bee interview 74-year-old photo master Joel Meyerowitz about his new two-volume retrospective. We think it may be the start of a beautiful friendship.
It seems to me that there’s a moment when you press the shutter release on the camera when the person you are, the person holding the camera, says yes. Every time you take a picture, you’re saying yes to what you see
“Photography takes place in a fraction of a second,” Meyerowitz says. “There isn’t a lot of time to think about things. You have to hone your instinct. You learn to hone that skill and timing so you’re in the right place at the right time.”
An award-winning street photographer who has been creating memorable images in the great photojournalistic tradition since 1962, Joel Meyerowitz pioneered the use…
Tony and I looked at each other and said, “That must be Henri Cartier-Bresson. Tony pushes me to go and see this guy and I walk over and ask him, “Are you Henri Cartier-Bresson?” He says, “No, no I am not. Are you the police?” I said, “No, no we are just two photographers and we saw you working and thought you must be mad.” He said, “Yes I am Cartier-Bresson. You meet me here later and I take you for coffee.”