The Life Of A Genius Photographer - Edward STEICHEN 

Almost got carried away with this video! First edit was 45mins long!! Each stage of his career is worth an entire video to itself I reckon. What's your favourite part of his photography?

You are one of the most gifted speakers I have ever attended. You aren't constantly looking at an outline or notes. You just talk to us. Probably the easiest subscription on RU-vid.

Just wanted to say, this is such a wonderful channel and you are doing a great job. There is a purity to how you present information about these artists and their photographs. It's very refreshing and poetic in and of itself.

I think it is beyond critical to have these discussions on the art of photography. There is one other channel I follow for this reason. Way too much effort is spent worrying about gear and not enough on using light and creating/capturing emotion. I really appreciate your thoughts on these photographers and I am working my way through your videos. edit: His thoughts behind The Family of Man mirror my own experiences. Thank you for this.

Never knew until about him until about 15 to 20 years ago.He was my relative. My Mom was a Steichen.My grandpa was from Luxembourg So thrilled to learn about his amazing career!

I took photo history at 40 years old and you cover all my favorites and greats. When one of my old timer professors told me my Lilly self portrait was liken to Immogen Cunningham. I love her work and love these videos !

I haven't seen Edward's work since my photo classes 35+ years ago. Thanks for reminding me how talented he was. This type of video inspire viewers to take pictures, not just buy new equipment. Thanks for your videos.

I've been a professional Industrial photographer for 40 years. It's wonderful to still be learning from the greats. Great video and I shall be keeping an eye out for more of your videos.

Have only just found your RU-vid channel, what a breath of fresh air you bring, at last someone who shows an appreciation for photography rather than endless chat about which camera is better than the other. I have subscribed to "The Photographic Eye" and look forward to watching more of your excellent videos.

These profiles are excellent. I’m a believer in knowing the history of your craft, plus they give me new ideas when I’m in a rut.

I am so glad I found your channel; it’s wonderfully inspiring. I’ve often found myself dabbling with black and white (pulling down the saturation on colour images) and then dismissing my efforts as ‘pretentious’ and the easy way to look ‘arty’ - even though I really enjoyed the process and how it seemed to extract or even bring meaning to competent but otherwise meaningless images. Your channel is inspiring me to shoot in black and white, with intent, rather than playing with colour images. Thank you!

I love Steichen for his pictorial style, but clear, sharp photography like Ansel Adam's has its appeal as well. IMHO, what matters most is what a picture evokes in its viewers. Each photographer has his or her own style. It is up to the photographer to find that style and be true to self.

I like s-o much b&w photography... I find these images absolutely stunning... GENIUS! Thank you so much for this material! 🙏

I just LOVE your channel. Speaking of great photographers, I think we all would like to see more of YOUR work!

The Flatiron Building photo is what made me a photographer

Absolutely fantastic! What a polymath and creative giant.

Steichen's work is fantastic, based on this video I'm going to dig deeper. Thanks for this and all the other videos, looking forword to more.

Your series on important and influential photographers is exceptional. So interesting and inspiring. I want to learn more. Your channel is providing, what I think, a much needed look at why photography is an important medium. Some of this I did learn decades ago but your presentations are reigniting my interest.

Great video! I have never seen that photos of the building. Exceptionally surprised.

Loved Penelope Niven’s biographies of Steichen and Sandburg. Also found his early experiments with Autochrome fascinating.

Adams comment is easily understandable as a reflection of the dichotomy between the zeitgeists of New York and the environmental Western US at the time and I'm inclined to nod in agreement. I was a music student in the late 60s early 70s in Texas and we were totally convinced that NY was the most parochially insular town in the whole US as regards classical and jazz ("if it's not in New York t's not worth paying attention to") and while I wasn't into the academics of that sphere of photography at the time, I can see Adams making that comment regarding a "commercial" photographer getting that curatorial position.

What an inspirational and moving video. Thank you Alex.

We are bombarded with tack sharp photo images and they begin to get tiresome. I suppose this might be what inspired the lensbaby movement where people wanted to get away from all of that, but that said, they aren't quite Pictorialism. I love the pictorialists. I try to process like that. I look for ways to shoot like that. OK, that said, let me say something about you.... you are phenomenal and I thank you for your channel. You are the art teacher I had when I was young - the one who made me think, not the one I wanted to copy. Goodness, who would want to copy, but there is so much of that now, as well. You take us on a journey that evokes thought and promotes inner creativity. You are the best!

Dang. This channel is impressive. Thank you for this.

Thanks Alex, came here to watch after your video about style.

Thanks for sharing 🙏🏽 what a journey!

Awesome!! Commenting as I see!!

I'm so enjoying your channel. I found you at a crucial moment as I've been in such a creative rut lately. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!

I was looking for channel like yours, happy to say I hit the jackpot! Great job!

I just discovered your channel and am really enjoying it. It's nice to learn about photography and not gear for a change. Please keep up the good work.

I really enjoyed this video - thank you -- and I must admit I am a huge fan of the pictorialist aesthetic. I think it's important to remember that the "clean, digital look" way predates modern digital sensors, and arose with photographers like Adams and the other f.64 crowd, who explicitly rejected pictorialism in favour of the sharp, "straight" aesthetic, and that kind of continues to today. But I think that no matter what the fashion, there will always be a latent "photo-secession" who use photographic imaging in a less "straight" / realistic way - whether they are using pocket 110 cameras, or 100MP Hasselblads to do it. Thanks again - I really look forward to more videos in this series.

This Channel is Gold

First, thanks for your videos. They are informative & interesting. I thoroughly enjoy them. In response to your question about pictorialist vs digital photography I tend to think digital is like a photocopier i.e. same camera & lens combo produce fairly predictable results. When images are brought into a computer they can produce pretty amazing results. The only problem is that software proficiency determines the outcome and photography takes a back seat. So is photography real or is some sort of computer generated digital presentation or maybe it is a case of ‘s/he who has the best preset collection wins’? I like convenience of digital SLR’s. I also like authenticity so I try not to over process my images. I also bought a number of older pre digital lenses that I use on an older DSLR. I’m not looking for the sharpest image or the one with 100 megapixels. Instead I’m looking for what In can produce with a 12 megapixel DSLR, 30-40 year old lenses and minimal photo processing. These lenses are also excellent for IR photography. For sport photography its very difficult if not impossible to go past digital. I really admire sports film photographers. No second chances for them while digital just cranks them out to the maximum output of the camera being used.

Great insight into more unconventional outlook on what makes a great photography. With more fuzzy photography, perhaps the overall concept is to let the viewer finish the picture to his liking with the help of his own imagination. For instance with painters, a good example could be that of Edward Hopper who leaves something unachieved in his paintings, with some undefined expectancy that various commenters qualified with such words as insoluble enigma and many other concepts, Others said there ara as many Hopper as viewers of his artwork. Once more, many thanks for re-awakening the real matter at the root of good photography that gives full swing to imagination !

Definitely a thumbs up. I accidentally found your channel in my search of inspiration

I am thoroughly loving these videos!! Thank you so much, truly appreciated!! 😃🙏🏼🙏🏼

Anyone who truly studies the history of photography will be a Steichen fan. Huge influence on the medium!

Thanks for talking about what is in the frame. Lots of how to but little about what is. Photography doesn’t stand still and the history of it is important if one expects to improve.

Thank you so much for your videos. Your videos present the art of photography more than just techniques or gears. It really helps me appreciate photography not just as a skill, but as art.

Pictorial appears more art like. I wonder how you could get this look with digital equipment.....I will have to look this up. Great video!

I adore B &W!

Great episode! Thank you!

I definitely agree with the pictorialist style being more organic and interesting. It is hard to replicate that, as well as the special "accidents" that often happen in analog photography, with digital tools.

Edward Steichen is from my country, Luxembourg. And in my home city we have a permanent exhibition of his work (The Bitter Years) located at the top of a water tower. The Family Of Man is also permanently located in a city in Luxembourg. I have now binge watched a lot of your videos and I must say that this is exactly what I needed. My passion for photography started diminishing last year in Fall and only a few weeks ago I started to take street photos again eventhough I have my camera every single day with me in my bag when I go to work and have many opportunities to shoot. The subjects you talk about are so important especially in our age with Instagram/social media and the hunt for likes. And this was a reason why I lost my passion. I also find it interesting that you brought up the subject of music, punk to be specific, as coincidentially I also play in a punk band. The „I dont give a sh!t attitude“ comes way easier almost naturally to me when playing guitar and writing music than when going out to take photos. It‘s just something about the instant feedback (or lack of) of instagram that put me under enormous pressure. Self-inflicted, because my mindset and focus were in the wrong place. Your videos definitely help in easing the pressure and re-kindling that fire, even re-calibrating my mindset and attitude towards photography. This is something I miss from other channels. Thank you for being real and making these videos!

I'm a big fan of Edward Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, and Ansel Adams. Thanks for creating this Episode. I forgot to mention Henri-Cartier Bresson.

Yes, I’m with you as far as preferring a painterly image over an unnaturally detailed, clinical digital image. That said, it is amazing at how clean and crisp much of his fashion work appears.

Love your work! Thank you for your wonderful videos!

Great review with all the research and commentary

I don't think it is binary. I like both the precise digital and the pictorialists like Steichen. Nice presentation.

I've often wondered how photographers like Steichen, Atget and other 'mould-breakers' would have viewed modern digital photography. Would the new technology have changed their style, subject matter and so on..?

It’s funny that you mention Adams’ reaction about Steichen, because for long it has sounded like he and Weston were the great ones. I actually had an image of Steichen more as a second Newhall and the curator of The Family of Man than as a great photographer himself, although that image has been long dispelled. A couple months back I had to write a scholarly essay about Arbus, and came across Berenice Abbott as a potential influencer, and she was another big surprise. About pictorialism, although I am a digital photographer, I’m more and more interested by that border with the unreal that certain film brings. I think there is an emerging current of photographers who are either going back at least partially to the old medium or working fully digitally but trying to explore this no man’s land between photography and painting, indexicality and what could be. Thanks for the video, I loved it.

Love the early secession work but equally appreciate work that reacted against the pictorial style - yeah I'm lookin' at you Ansel

Incredibly interesting, I love the soft, ethereal style prints.

Exceptional and informative video my friend! Liked and subscribed

Well done. informative and inspiring.

It’s strange that you ask how we feel about pictorialism vs the cleaner digital photography of today... because it skips all the very clean pre-digital work that was done. In particular, by the members of f64 who were specifically trying to get away from pictorialism. That said, IMO both have their merits and don’t necessarily need to be mutually exclusive unless we’re talking about them historically. Great videos, btw!

So good! Thank You!

BRAVO SIR!! 😃

This is amazing. Thank you

I'm just catching up to this video in your catalogue. I enjoy both "clean" and "atmospheric/pictorial" images, and I've shot both depending on the subject. Towards the latter style, I've dabbled in ICM, long exposure, and Orton Effect post-processing. More and more over the last year, I'm using varying post-processing techniques to create mood and atmosphere. I'm very much a work in progress, but as a former painter I like working my images to create a feel, rather than just photographic reportage.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge

thank you .

Hello Alex. Just a little thank-you for this wonderful channel you have. I have been binge watching it over the last few days. I am a beginning photographer and these videos really inspire me to do more creative work. Also, are you familiar with the work of Francesca Woodman? I saw her work for the first time in a gallery I randomly walked into (to get out of the Scottish rain) and was just taken by it. At the time I was not a photographer, not even an amateur one and knew nothing about art photography, but she is still one of my all-time favourites. Would love to see a video about her if you feel inspired to do so. Anyway, hope to see many more of our videos.

The Family Of Man exhibition came to my city Ahmedabad, India in 1957. I saw it twice and then and there decided that I am going to be a photographer..I was 13 years old and I have been working as a photographer since 55 years.

I enjoyed this. It made me think along these lines... Maybe the final barrier to a full democratisation of photography is our society. By which I mean, as a white man of middle years (that describes 90% of photographers I see around me) I feel safe and entitled to go out, maybe onto the streets and poke my lens into peoples' business. I don't think everyone feels that safe and entitled, and so we don't yet see the (most likely very different types of) photographs they would see and capture.

both forms hard edge and plct.great video tipingyou hat to the masters.

Ok...so I do have a bone to pick with you! By the end of your videos I want to grab my camera and jump into some photography....but I can't....because I'm usually watching when I'm already neck deep in a pile of laundry that needs folding. 🙃 So frustrating! 😆

Love this

Amazing video!

thx for this wonderful content full of details !

absolutely fantastic photography channel.

Thanks!

You have the best videos ☺️

thanks !

This was excellent!

This was wonderful, thank you

The pictorialist movement is still of great inspiration. To me at least!

Really enjoy your content, it is just a shame that you have recently added an excessive amount of mid reel adverts.

I don't think Adams ever forgave him for the soft focus years! F 64 baby!

It was not too long; thanks.

Actually I like both styles. The more muted style of the pictorialists and natural digital photography (not heavily edited)

Pictorialism every time for me. Thanks Alex.

Thanks. Photography is so diverse, but I do love the impressionist work of the early photographers. Their work is a salutary lesson to people , like me, who can obsess over sharpness and detail. I need more reminders like this in order to focus on the art.

I like his earlier work. Can you recommend aphotographer that photograph infrastructure?

As to the question of which is to be preferred: Abstract, surreal, moody sorts of images or hyper-sharp modern images, the answer is neither and both. Great art is great art. Bad work is bad work. Good art moves something inside us. One might examine the work of eberhard grossgasteiger or kokokara on pexels or Ansel Adams to see that beautiful images made with great equipment can be first rate art. (One might argue that Ansel Adams was using a primitive box with a sheet of film at the far end, but an 8 x 10 large format camera easily rivals the sharp detail of a medium format digital camera. See Ben Horne for a modern equivalent). Steve O'nions work on youtube has taken a recent turn to the moody and more abstract, using pinhole or holga type images (see his 2021 year in review video for samples). Put another way, is Picasso better than Rembrandt? Is DaVinci better than Van Gough? There are no right or wrong answers to those questions other than personal leanings. There can be a sort of an answer, which is your personal preference. But that image is colored by the prism of our own ideologies, and one person's preferences are no better than another's.

What a great man and Photographer, he crossed over many genres with great panache. Bit sad the comment from Mr. Adams but not surprising, a bit of jealousy going on I think.

11:48 Wow just wow I have to find this in text to share.

nothing more suggestive than a photo with an analog look.

Interesting but lacking an explanation for the perfectly valid reasons why Ansel Adams had reservations about Steichen's work.

Do you think if he could have done a pano He would’ve put the full height of the building?

Another excellent presentation. Ansel Adams definitely had a caustic element to his makeup.

Pictorialism should have a stake driven through its heart. Sadly it still exists in the jurassic wildernesses of the British amateur camera club. Steichen and his contemporaries rejected this aspect of photography later as being mawkish and 'un photographic'.

Can't stand digital clean-ultrasharp look anymore!

Ibecame very tired of looking at that shirt,,blew the whole video

Wow. 𝕵𝖚𝖘𝖙 𝖌𝖔𝖗𝖌𝖊𝖔𝖚𝖘.

Steichen produced the images that inspired me more than any other artist in the medium - no one has ever resonated more with me in all these years. Perhaps not only because of his style but also because his humanity glows behind every image. Lovely video, thank you.

Thanks!

Great content!

I recently stumbled onto your channel and have to say this is exactly what RU-vid needed, great job. Thanks for the videos and keep them going. Cheers!

Another terrific review. Thank you. RS. Canada