Helen Levitt
Encyclopedia
Helen Levitt was an American photographer. She was particularly noted for "street photography
" around New York City, and has been called "the most celebrated and least known photographer of her time."
that were part of the New York children's street culture
of the time. She purchased a Leica camera and began to photograph these works, as well as the children who made them. The resulting photographs were ultimately published in 1987 as In The Street: chalk drawings and messages, New York City 1938–1948.
She associated with Walker Evans
in 1938-39. She enjoyed early success. In July 1939, the new photography section of the Museum of Modern Art
in New York City included Levitt's work in its inaugural exhibition. In 1943, Nancy Newhall
curated her first solo exhibition "Helen Levitt: Photographs of Children" there. Her next major shows were in the 1960s; Amanda Hopkinson suggests that this second wave of recognition was related to the feminist rediscovery of women's creative achievements.
In the late 1940s, Levitt made two documentary films with Janice Loeb and James Agee
: In the Street
(1948) and The Quiet One
(1948). Levitt, along with Loeb and Sidney Meyers
, received an Academy Award nomination for the screenplay of The Quiet One. Levitt was active in film making for nearly 25 years; her final film credit is as an editor for John Cohen's documentary The End of an Old Song (1972). Levitt's other film credits include the cinematography on The Savage Eye
(1960), which was produced by Ben Maddow
, Meyers, and Joseph Strick
, and also as an assistant director for Strick and Maddow's film version
of Genet's
play The Balcony
(1963). In her biographical essay, Maria Hambourg writes that Levitt "has all but disinherited this part of her work."
In 1959 and 1960, Levitt received two Guggenheim Foundation
grants to take color photographs on the streets of New York, and she returned to still photography. In 1965 she published her first major collection, A Way of Seeing. Much of her work in color from the 1960s was stolen in a 1970 burglary of her East 13th Street apartment. The remaining photos, and others taken in the following years, can be seen in the 2005 book Slide Show: The Color Photographs of Helen Levitt. In 1976, she was a Photography Fellow of the National Endowment for the Arts
.
She lived in New York City and remained active as a photographer for nearly 70 years. New York's "visual poet laureate
" was notoriously private and publicity shy.
Street photography
Street photography is a type of documentary photography that features subjects in candid situations within public places such as streets, parks, beaches, malls, political conventions and other settings....
" around New York City, and has been called "the most celebrated and least known photographer of her time."
Biography
Levitt grew up in Brooklyn. Dropping out of high school, she taught herself photography while working for a commercial photographer. While teaching some classes in art to children in 1937, Levitt became intrigued with the transitory chalk drawingsSidewalk chalk
Sidewalk chalk are typically large colored sticks of calcium sulfate mostly used for drawing on pavement or cement sidewalk. It is sometimes used to draw a four square court or a hopscotch board.-Use:...
that were part of the New York children's street culture
Children's street culture
Children's street culture refers to the cumulative culture created by young children. Collectively, this body of knowledge is passed down from one generation of urban children to the next, and can also be passed between different groups of children . It is most common in children between the ages...
of the time. She purchased a Leica camera and began to photograph these works, as well as the children who made them. The resulting photographs were ultimately published in 1987 as In The Street: chalk drawings and messages, New York City 1938–1948.
She associated with Walker Evans
Walker Evans
Walker Evans was an American photographer best known for his work for the Farm Security Administration documenting the effects of the Great Depression. Much of Evans's work from the FSA period uses the large-format, 8x10-inch camera...
in 1938-39. She enjoyed early success. In July 1939, the new photography section of 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...
in New York City included Levitt's work in its inaugural exhibition. In 1943, Nancy Newhall
Nancy Newhall
Nancy Wynne Newhall was an American photography critic. She is best known for writing the text to accompany photographs by Ansel Adams and Edward Weston, but was also a widely published writer on photography, conservation, and American culture.Newhall was born Nancy Wynne in Lynn, Massachusetts,...
curated her first solo exhibition "Helen Levitt: Photographs of Children" there. Her next major shows were in the 1960s; Amanda Hopkinson suggests that this second wave of recognition was related to the feminist rediscovery of women's creative achievements.
In the late 1940s, Levitt made two documentary films with Janice Loeb and James Agee
James Agee
James Rufus Agee was an American author, journalist, poet, screenwriter and film critic. In the 1940s, he was one of the most influential film critics in the U.S...
: In the Street
In the Street (film)
In the Street is a 16-minute documentary film released in 1948 and again in 1952. The black and white, silent film was shot in the mid 1940s in the Spanish Harlem section of New York City. Helen Levitt, Janice Loeb, and James Agee were the cinematographers; they used small, hidden 16 mm film...
(1948) and The Quiet One
The Quiet One
The Quiet One is a 1948 American documentary film directed by Sidney Meyers. The documentary chronicles the rehabilitation of a young, emotionally disturbed African-American boy; it contains a commentary written by James Agee, and narrated by Gary Merrill...
(1948). Levitt, along with Loeb and Sidney Meyers
Sidney Meyers
Sidney Meyers was an American film director and editor.Sidney Meyers is best known for two documentary films: The Quiet One, which he wrote and directed, and for which he was nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay; and British Academy of Film and Television Arts winner The Savage Eye,...
, received an Academy Award nomination for the screenplay of The Quiet One. Levitt was active in film making for nearly 25 years; her final film credit is as an editor for John Cohen's documentary The End of an Old Song (1972). Levitt's other film credits include the cinematography on The Savage Eye
The Savage Eye
The Savage Eye is a "dramatized documentary" film that superposes a dramatic narration of the life of a divorced woman with documentary camera footage of an unspecified 1950s city. In a 1960 review, A. H...
(1960), which was produced by Ben Maddow
Ben Maddow
Ben Maddow was a prolific screenwriter and documentarian from the 1930s through the 70s. Educated at Columbia University, Maddow began his career working within the American documentary movement in the 30s.In 1936 he co-founded the short-lived left-wing newsreel The World Today...
, Meyers, and Joseph Strick
Joseph Strick
Joseph Strick was an American director, producer and screenwriter.Born in Braddock, Pennsylvania, Strick briefly attended UCLA before enrolling in the Army during World War II. In the Army, he served as a cameraman in the Army Air Forces.In 1948, he and Irving Lerner produced Muscle Beach...
, and also as an assistant director for Strick and Maddow's film version
The Balcony (film)
The Balcony is a 1963 cinematic adaptation of Jean Genet's play The Balcony, directed by Joseph Strick. It starred Shelley Winters, Peter Falk, Lee Grant and Leonard Nimoy. George J. Folsey was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography. Ben Maddow was nominated for a Writers Guild of...
of Genet's
Jean Genet
Jean Genet was a prominent and controversial French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. Early in his life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but later took to writing...
play The Balcony
The Balcony
The Balcony is a play by the French dramatist Jean Genet. Since Peter Zadek directed its first production at the Arts Theatre Club in London in 1957, the play has attracted many of the greatest directors of the 20th century, including Peter Brook, Erwin Piscator, Roger Blin, Giorgio Strehler, and...
(1963). In her biographical essay, Maria Hambourg writes that Levitt "has all but disinherited this part of her work."
In 1959 and 1960, Levitt received two Guggenheim Foundation
Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation is a nonprofit corporation founded in 1937 by philanthropist Solomon R. Guggenheim and artist Hilla von Rebay. The first museum established by the foundation was the "Museum of Non-Objective Art", which was housed in rented space on Park Avenue in New York....
grants to take color photographs on the streets of New York, and she returned to still photography. In 1965 she published her first major collection, A Way of Seeing. Much of her work in color from the 1960s was stolen in a 1970 burglary of her East 13th Street apartment. The remaining photos, and others taken in the following years, can be seen in the 2005 book Slide Show: The Color Photographs of Helen Levitt. In 1976, she was a Photography Fellow of the National Endowment for the Arts
National Endowment for the Arts
The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created by an act of the U.S. Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. Its current...
.
She lived in New York City and remained active as a photographer for nearly 70 years. New York's "visual poet laureate
Poet Laureate
A poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...
" was notoriously private and publicity shy.
Filmography
- In the StreetIn the Street (film)In the Street is a 16-minute documentary film released in 1948 and again in 1952. The black and white, silent film was shot in the mid 1940s in the Spanish Harlem section of New York City. Helen Levitt, Janice Loeb, and James Agee were the cinematographers; they used small, hidden 16 mm film...
(1948): cinematographer. - The Quiet OneThe Quiet OneThe Quiet One is a 1948 American documentary film directed by Sidney Meyers. The documentary chronicles the rehabilitation of a young, emotionally disturbed African-American boy; it contains a commentary written by James Agee, and narrated by Gary Merrill...
(1948): cinematographer and writer. - The Savage EyeThe Savage EyeThe Savage Eye is a "dramatized documentary" film that superposes a dramatic narration of the life of a divorced woman with documentary camera footage of an unspecified 1950s city. In a 1960 review, A. H...
(1960): cinematographer. - The BalconyThe Balcony (film)The Balcony is a 1963 cinematic adaptation of Jean Genet's play The Balcony, directed by Joseph Strick. It starred Shelley Winters, Peter Falk, Lee Grant and Leonard Nimoy. George J. Folsey was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography. Ben Maddow was nominated for a Writers Guild of...
(1963): assistant director. - An Affair of the SkinAn Affair of the SkinAn Affair of the Skin is a 1963 film written and directed by Ben Maddow. It is a complex story of the romantic entanglements of its several characters as seen through the eyes of a black woman photographer. Shortly after its release, the film was harshly reviewed in Time Magazine and The New York...
(1963): co-producer with Ben MaddowBen MaddowBen Maddow was a prolific screenwriter and documentarian from the 1930s through the 70s. Educated at Columbia University, Maddow began his career working within the American documentary movement in the 30s.In 1936 he co-founded the short-lived left-wing newsreel The World Today...
. - In the Year of the PigIn the Year of the PigIn the Year of the Pig is a 1968 American documentary film about the origins of the Vietnam War, directed by Emile de Antonio. It was nominated for an Academy award for best documentary....
(1968): co-editor with Hannah Moreinis. - The End of an Old Song (1972): editor.
External links
- 24 images at the lensculture website.
- Online portfolio and biography at the Laurence Miller Gallery website.
- Block, Melissa (2002). "Helen Levitt's Indelible Eye", audio interview from the All Things Considered radio program, 17 January 2002, National Public Radio.
- Boxer, Sarah (2004). "Capturing Little Dramas With a Click; Helen Levitt's Pictures Speak for Themselves," The New York Times, 8 April 2004. Critical study of ten of Levitt's photographs. Dikant also discusses the influences on Levitt, including Henri Cartier Bresson, Ben ShahnBen ShahnBen Shahn was a Lithuanian-born American artist. He is best known for his works of social realism, his left-wing political views, and his series of lectures published as The Shape of Content.-Biography:...
, and Walker Evans.. Note that there is occasionally confusion of Levitt's film credits with those of Helen Slote Levitt. - Helen Levitt - Daily Telegraph obituary
- Obituary in The IndependentThe IndependentThe Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
by Marcus Williamson - Helen Levitt - Galerie f 5,6