Dan Budnik is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 photographer noted for his portraits of artists and photographs of the Civil Rights Movement

Civil rights movement

The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...

 and Native American life.

Born in 1933 in Long Island, New York, Budnik studied at the Art Students League of New York

Art Students League of New York

The Art Students League of New York is an art school located on West 57th Street in New York City. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists, and has maintained for over 130 years a tradition of offering reasonably priced classes on a...

 in the early 1950s. After working as an assistant to Philippe Halsman

Philippe Halsman

Philippe Halsman was an American portrait photographer.-Life and work:Born to a Jewish family of Morduch Halsman, a dentist, and Ita Grintuch, a grammar school principal, in Riga, Halsman studied electrical engineering in Dresden....

, he joined Magnum Photos

Magnum Photos

Magnum Photos is an international photographic cooperative owned by its photographer-members, with offices located in New York, Paris, London and Tokyo...

 in 1957, eventually photographing material for Life

Life (magazine)

Life generally refers to three American magazines:*A humor and general interest magazine published from 1883 to 1936. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name....

, Sports Illustrated

Sports Illustrated

Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...

, and Vogue

Vogue (magazine)

Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...

magazines. In 1963, Budnik persuaded Life to have him create a long-term photo essay showing the seriousness of the Selma to Montgomery march

Selma to Montgomery marches

The Selma to Montgomery marches were three marches in 1965 that marked the political and emotional peak of the American civil rights movement. They grew out of the voting rights movement in Selma, Alabama, launched by local African-Americans who formed the Dallas County Voters League...

.

Budnik has photographed Candice Bergen

Candice Bergen

Candice Patricia Bergen is an American actress and former fashion model.She is known for starring in two TV series, as the title character on the situation comedy Murphy Brown , for which she won five Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards; and as Shirley Schmidt on the comedy-drama Boston Legal...

, Sophia Loren

Sophia Loren

Sophia Loren, OMRI is an Italian actress.In 1962, Loren won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in Two Women, along with 21 awards, becoming the first actress to win an Academy Award for a non-English-speaking performance...

, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...

, Georgia O'Keeffe

Georgia O'Keeffe

Georgia Totto O'Keeffe was an American artist.Born near Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, O'Keeffe first came to the attention of the New York art community in 1916, several decades before women had gained access to art training in America’s colleges and universities, and before any of its women artists...

, Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning was a Dutch American abstract expressionist artist who was born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands....

, and Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...

. The American Society of Media Photographers

American Society of Media Photographers

The American Society of Media Photographers, abbreviated ASMP, is a trade association of professional photographers, including many photojournalists but also experts in architectural, underwater, culinary and advertising photography and other specialties as well...

 awarded Budnik to its 1998 Honor Roll Award.
Budnik has work is in the collections of the King Center

King Center

King Center may refer to:*Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site, Atlanta, Georgia*Maxwell C. King Center for the Performing Arts, Melbourne, Florida...

 in Atlanta, Georgia

Atlanta, Georgia

Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...

 and the Museum of Modern Art

Museum of Modern Art

The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...

. Budnik also exhibited his work at the Agnes

Agnes (gallery)

Agnes was a Birmingham, Alabama photography gallery from 1993 to 2001. Shawn Boley, Jon Coffelt and Jan Hughes opened the gallery with the mission of attempting to raise awareness of social issues — such as cancer, AIDS, death and dying, the environment, homelessness, ethics, racism,...

 gallery.

Budnik lives in Tucson, Arizona

Tucson, Arizona

Tucson is a city in and the county seat of Pima County, Arizona, United States. The city is located 118 miles southeast of Phoenix and 60 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. The 2010 United States Census puts the city's population at 520,116 with a metropolitan area population at 1,020,200...

.

Book

• The Book of Elders: The Life Stories of Great American Indians, as told to Sandy Johnson, photographed by Dan Budnik. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1994. ISBN 978-0-06-250837-9

External links

• Budnik's biography and Selma to Montgomery photo essay
• Collection of Budnik's Civil Rights photos
• Dan Budnik bio at Knoedler & Company

See also

• Photographers of the American Civil Rights Movement
  Photographers of the American Civil Rights Movement
  Beginning with the murder of Emmett Till in 1955, photography and photographers played an important role in advancing the American Civil Rights Movement by documenting the public and private acts of racial discrimination against African Americans...