Pho·tog Friday: Irving Penn's "Portraits and Still Lifes"

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Portrait of Irving Penn

Known for his fashion photography, portraits and still lives, Irving Penn was an American Photographer born in the heart of the Garden State in 1917. Penn was the son of a watchmaker, Henry Penn, and a nurse, Sonia Greenberg. Growing up, Penn wanted to be a painter and attended the Philadelphia Museum School of Industrial Art from 1934 to 1938. He studied and worked under the art director, Alexey Brodovitch, of Harper's Bazaar magazine, which published several of Penn's drawings. In 1940, Penn began working as the art director for Saks Fifth Avenue in New York City. In 1941, Penn left Sacks to spend a year painting and taking photographs across the United States and Mexico.

Penn, Irving, Vogue October, 1943.

Penn returned to New York City and began to take photographs for Vogue magazine. He was offered an associate position by Alexander Liberman. Initially, Penn worked within the publication's Art Department on the layout of the magazine although before too long, Liberman asked Penn to try photography. In October of 1943, Penn had his photograph published on the cover of Vogue for the first time.

Penn's cover image is a charming image displaying a variety of fashion accessories. Over the next fifty years of Penn's career at Vogue, this would be the first of 150 cover photographs. Not only did he take photographs to be featured on the cover of Vogue, but Penn also shot portraits, fashion, photographic essays and still lifes.

In 1947, Irving Penn met his wife, Lisa Fonssagrives, at Vogue while she was modeling for a series titled "12 Beauties: The Most Photographed Models in America". Recalling this glimpse of his future wife, Penn later stated, “I loved her when I first set eyes on her. The two married in 1950 and had a son, Tom Penn, two years later.

Penn, Irving, Balenciaga 'Little Great' Coat (Lisa Fonssagrives-Penn), Paris, 1950.

Penn was one of the first photographers to place his subjects in front of a grey or plain white background. This allowed the fashion to "speak for itself" without any distractions in the background. The saying, "less is more" would certainly apply to Penn's work.

Penn, Irving, Man Lighting Girl's Cigarette (Jean Patchette), New York, 1949.

Penn, Irving, Black & White Vogue Cover (Jean Patchette), New York, 1950.

Penn, Irving, Flower Hat (by Philip Treacy), New York, 1995.

For many of his photographs taken during the 1940s, Penn placed them in the corner of two grey walls, which limited the subject's freedom to move although simultaneously, created leading lines that lead the viewer's eye right to the subject. He relied on a simple backdrop so that his subjects - and their personalities - would stand out more in the photograph. He took photographs of many famous artists of his day: Martha Graham, Marcel Duchamp, Pablo Picasso, Georgia O'Keefe, W.H. Auden and Igor Stravinsky:

Penn, Irving, Igor Stravinsky, 1948.

In the 1950s, Penn developed a new style with his portraits. He brought his camera very close to his subject's face and focused mainly on their gaze and expression. The eyes of Picasso in Penn's portrait below (left) almost seem as though they are floating between his hat and collar. For an artist who relied heavily on vision to create his paintings, this phenomenon of the "floating eye" only seemed appropriate. Later throughout his career, Penn photographed those whose artistic ability may have relied less on sight and more on the "inner life". Notice how the eyes of author Truman Capote (right) are closed:

Penn, Irving, Pablo Picasso, 1957 (left), Truman Capote, 1965 (right).

In terms of Penn's still life photographs, the objects within his images were carefully arranged prior to the shoot. Known for his highly organizational skills when staging a still life, Penn would place assemblages of food or objects together in order to make a statement, tell a story or simply, arouse an emotion within his viewers. What makes Penn's still life images different from other artists' is the simple fact that his image also contain a bit of humor and joy.

In 2001, Penn personally oversaw the layout of his book titled Still Life. This was the first book to ever be published that contained solely Penn's photographs. Images within the book were taken between 1938 and 2000. John Szarkowski notes the following in the introduction of the book, "for more than forty years Penn's pictures celebrated the pleasures of this life, even while always acknowledging the worm in the apple... Some of his more recent still lifes seem in contrast to have less to do with pleasure than with something like cultural reportage".