Bruce davidson biography photographer

Bruce Davidson began taking photographs at the age of ten in Oak Park, Illinois. In 1949, when he was 16, Davidson won his first prize for photography in the Kodak National High School Competition. He attended Rochester Institute of Technology and Yale University and in 1957, after serving in the military, worked as a freelance photographer for Life magazine. Davidson joined Magnum Photos in 1958.

Davidson photographed extensively between 1958 and 1961, producing such bodies of work as "The Dwarf,” "Brooklyn Gang” and "Freedom Rides.” He received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1962, during which he documented the ongoing Civil Rights Movement. Davidson captured images of an early Malcolm X rally in Harlem, steel workers in Chicago, Klu Klux Klan cross burnings, migrant farm camps in South Carolina, cotton pickers in Georgia and the protest marches and demonstrations in Birmingham and Selma, Alabama. New York’s Museum of Modern Art presented these images in a solo show in 1963.

In 1966 he was awarded the first grant for photography from the National Endowment for the Arts, and spent two years documenting one block in East Harlem. This work was published by Harvard University Press in 1970 under the title "East 100th Street". The work became an exhibition that same year at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

In 1967, he received the first grant for photography from the National Endowment for the Arts, having spent two years witnessing the dire social conditions on one block in East Harlem. This work was published by Harvard University Press in 1970 under the title East 100th Street and was later republished and expanded by St. Ann’s Press. The work became an exhibition that same year at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 2006, he completed a series of photographs titled “The Nature of Paris,” many of which have been shown and acquired by the American Academ

American photographer

Bruce Landon Davidson (born September 5, 1933) is an American photographer, who has been a member of the Magnum Photos agency since 1958. His photographs, notably those taken in Harlem, New York City, have been widely exhibited and published. He is known for photographing communities that are usually hostile to outsiders.

Biography

Early life and education

Davidson was born on September 5, 1933, in Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago, to a Jewish family of Polish origins. When he was 10, his mother built him a darkroom in their basement and he began taking photographs. When he was fifteen, his mother remarried to a lieutenant commander in the navy who was given a Kodak rangefinder camera, which Davidson was allowed to use before being given a more advanced camera for his bar mitzvah. He was employed at Austin Camera as a stock boy and was approached by local news photographer Al Cox, who taught him the technical nuances of photography, in addition to lighting and printing skills, including dye transfer colour. His artistic influences included Robert Frank, Eugene Smith, and Henri Cartier-Bresson.

At 19, Davidson won his first national recognition for his photography, the 1952 Kodak National High School Photographic Award, for a picture of an owl. From 1951, Davidson attended the Rochester Institute of Technology where he used a second-hand Contax to photograph at Lighthouse Mission as he studied under Ralph Hattersley, and in 1955,

Born in Oak Park, Illinois, in 1933, Bruce Davidson won first prize in the Kodak National High School Competition at the age of 16. He went on to attend the Rochester Institute of Technology and Yale University.

During military service in Paris, Davidson met Henri Cartier-Bresson, one of the founders of Magnum Photos, and in 1958 became a full member (he is now a contributor). After leaving the military, he worked as a freelance photographer for Life, and from 1958 to 1961 created such seminal bodies of work as Circus, Brooklyn Gang, and Freedom Rides. He received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1962 and created a profound documentation of the civil rights movement in America, later published as Time of Change. In 1963, the Museum of Modern Art in New York presented his early work in a solo exhibition.

The first photography grant from the National Endowment for the Arts was awarded to Davidson in 1967. He spent two years witnessing the dire social conditions on one block in East Harlem and the resulting book, East 100th Street, was published by Harvard University Press in 1970. This work became an exhibition that same year at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, curated by John Szarkowski.

Davidson extended his view of the city in 1980 with Subway, which explored the New York underground and its subterranean travelers. His next project, Central Park, was a four-year encounter (1992–95) with the city’s magnificent green space — a convergence of humanity, nature and the city. Davidson’s film Living off the Land received the Critics Award from the American Film Festival. Henry Geldzahler, the former Curator of Modern Art at the Metropolitan Museum, New York, said, “The ability to enter so sympathetically into what seems superficially an alien environment remains Bruce Davidson’s sustained triumph; in his investigation he becomes the friendly recorder of tenderness and tragedy.”

Davidson continues to live and work in New York City.

BRUCE DAVIDSON (b. 1933 Oak Park, Illinois) began photography as a boy at the age of ten. While attending Rochester Institute of Technology and Yale University he continued to further his knowledge and develop his passion.  He was later drafted into the army and stationed near Paris where he met Henri Cartier-Bresson. When he left military service in 1957, Davidson worked as a freelance photographer for Life Magazine and in 1958 became a full member of Magnum Photos. From 1958 to 1961 he created such seminal bodies of work as The Dwarf, Brooklyn Gang, and Freedom Rides. In 1962 Davidson received a Guggenheim Fellowship to photograph what became a profound documentation of the American Civil Rights Movement, the highly acclaimed work known as Time of Change. In 1966 he was awarded the first grant for photography from the National Endowment for the Arts, having spent two years bearing witness to the dire social conditions on one block in East Harlem. This work was first published by Harvard University Press in 1970, under the title East 100th Street. In 1980 he captured the vitality of the New York Metro’s underworld that was later published in his book Subway and exhibited at the International Center for Photography in 1982. Other series include Central Park, Circus, Scotland/England, The Nature of LA, and more.

Classic bodies of work from Mr. Davidson’s 50-year career have been extensively published in monographs and are included in many major public and private fine art collections around the world.