| Irving Penn | |
|---|---|
| Born | June 16, 1917 |
| Died | October 7, 2009 (aged 92) |
| Occupation | Photographer |
| Spouse | Lisa Fonssagrives (m. 1950–1992) |
| Children | Tom Penn |
| Relatives | Arthur Penn (brother) |
Irving Penn (June 16, 1917 – October 7, 2009[1]) was an American photographer known for his portraiture and fashion photography.
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Irving Penn studied under Alexey Brodovitch at the Philadelphia Museum School of Industrial Art (now the University of the Arts) from which he was graduated in 1938. Penn's drawings were published by Harper's Bazaar and he also painted. As his career in photography blossomed, he became known for post World War II feminine chic and glamour photography.
Penn worked for many years doing fashion photography for Vogue magazine, founding his own studio in 1953. He was among the first photographers to pose subjects against a simple grey or white backdrop and used this simplicity more effectively than other photographers. Expanding his austere studio surroundings, Penn constructed a set of upright angled backdrops, to form a stark, acute corner. Subjects photographed with this technique included Martha Graham, Marcel Duchamp, Pablo Picasso, Georgia O'Keeffe, W. H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky
Irving Penn was born on June 16, 1917, in Plainfield, New Jersey, to Harry and Sonia Penn. From 1934 to 1938 he attended the Philadelphia Museum and School of Industrial Art in Philadelphia. He studied drawing, painting, graphic and industrial arts. Irving Penn died aged 92 on October 7, 2009 at his home in Manhattan.[2][3]
In 1950, Penn married his favorite model, Lisa Fonssagrives, at Chelsea Register Office. They met at a photo shoot in 1947.[4][5] Fonssagrives died in 1992. They had one son together, metal designer Tom Penn, who was born in 1952.[5] \His younger brother was movie director Arthur Penn, who died September 30, 2010, at age 88.
Penn photographed still life objects and found objects in unusual arrangements with great detail and clarity. While his prints are always clean and clear, Penn's subjects varied widely. Many times his photographs were so ahead of their time that they only came to be appreciated as important works in the modernist canon years after their creation. For example, a series of posed nudes whose physical shapes range from thin to plump were shot in 1949-1950, but were not exhibited until 1980. His still life compositions are skillfully arranged assemblages of food or objects; at once spare and highly organized, the objects articulate the abstract interplay of line and volume. His later works are made on aluminum sheets coated with a platinum emulsion rendering the image with a warmth and maturity that untoned silver prints lacked.
He published numerous books including the recent, "A Notebook at Random" which offers a generous selection of photographs, paintings, and documents of his working methods.
The permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum possesses a silver gelatin print of Penn's The Tarot Reader, a photograph from 1949 of Jean Patchett and surrealist painter Bridget Tichenor.[6]
The Irving Penn Archives, a collection of personal items and materials relating to his career, are held by the Ryerson & Burnham Libraries at the Art Institute of Chicago.
In 2002, 53 photographs were shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In many of these prints, the subjects appear sculptural and like a primitive Venus. The graphic detail and clarity of his images would not have been possible to put on display in earlier years.
In 2005, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. exhibited Irving Penn: Platinum Prints.
In 2008, 67 portraits were shown at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York City in an exhibit entitled Close Encounters.
In 2009, the J. Paul Getty Museum exhibited the most extensive collection of Irving Penn's works. The Small Trades is a collection of 252 full-length portraits by Penn from 1950 to 1951. Penn's subjects were from New York, Paris, and London.[7]
In 2010 The National Portrait Gallery (London) exhibited over 120 portraits of people from the worlds of literature, music and the visual and performing arts.
Irving Penn died aged 92 on October 7, 2009 at his home in Manhattan.[2][3]