Huub Koch | Creating Good Vibrations

andreas feininger

Andreas Feininger
Complete Photography & New York in the Fifties.

Andreas Feininger is a son of former Bauhaus professor Lyonel Feininger. He belongs to the Time-Life school of photography, which has its roots in documentairy photography. The style of this school is an expressive and creative type of photojournalism, with its aim in documenting human life in a humane, but scientific oriented way. The photography of the people that worked for Time-Life Inc. represent a high level of imagemaking. An approach that belongs to an era which was still without television, and dependant on illustrated newsmagazines for visual reports on all aspects of reality and history.

Andreas Feininger is not only a outstanding photographer, who’s works have become icons of american photography, he has also written numerous books upon the subject to share his insights with professionals and amateurs. These works serve as an inspiration, but also as an ethical and esthetic point of view which can act as a guide for everyone who is interested in photography. In this way he has contributed to photography as a professional and as a mentor.

The two books that have served me as an inspiration, Complete Photography and New York in the Fifties, belong to the publications that go beyond the present and thus become classics or legends. Complete Photography [in dutch: Fotografie van A tot Z] shows in great detail all the decisions a person has to go through in order to develop himself as an individual who uses photography in an expressive manner. From subject matter, through personal characteristics and style to making the choice for the right camera and darkroom technique.

The result is a way of photography that tells a story by creating an image that is loaded with meanings. Image that is the result of a coherent focus in mindset, decisiontaking, knowledge, practice and a consciousness that embraces life and its times to make a statement.

In his personal documentairy publication New York in the Fifties, Andreas Feininger tells his story about New York with great intimacy. The fact that certain images reach a high level of abstraction does not influence the human touch that reaches us by means of black and white photographs with a lot of shades of grey and whites and blacks.

Photography in the fifties did belong to a type of photographer that took pictures with respect, modesty and awareness. It lacked the kind of brutality and rudeness, which is so common today and is often mistaken for honesty and truth. It is a kind of photography that is demanding. It involves the viewer in being reflective upon the image and to take the time that is needed to feel its content. These books do not belong to the category of the easy do-it-yourself book or the coffee-table book. They belong to a past that is almost vanished. They also belong to a lineage of qualities that are part of the European culture of the Bauhaus, with its background in social reform and enlightenment.

Feiningers works and writings are about life and the art and arts of life. They create an awareness of the choices and possibilities that add to our personal well-being and support and encourage us to be true to ourselves. Such contribution goes beyond photography itself and the path that is described by Andres Feininger is therefore a creative endeavour that can be transferred to other diciplines like design, writing or art. It makes us ask ourselves if there can ever be room for compromise in life or in art. Its up to us to give the answer.