Talk:New York school of photography

A "school" of photography?

Although we have significant arguments for the existence of a "New York school of photography" (primarily Livingston, but also newspaper columnists etc), not everybody is convinced.

Karen Levitov's brief introduction to Max Kozloff's New York: Capital of Photography says that Kozloff "has selected images by both famous and lesser-known street photographers, particularly members of the so-called New York School from the 1930s to the 1960s, most of them Jewish". However, this is perhaps the only mention of the term in the book. If Kozloff mentions it, he does so only in passing. (Incidentally, he points out that Model was quite uninfluenced by Hine, thereby contradicting Livingston.) Kozloff does discuss the Photo League, a much more concrete institution.

That said, Livingston's book is widely cited and is still being cited over twenty years after its publication. (And incidentally it's large and handsome; and used copies, while easy to find, don't come cheap.) -- Hoary (talk) 23:40, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Not Livingston's term

Or anyway not one that was coined within her handsome book. I don't know where the term originated. (Surprisingly and annoyingly, Google's Ngram Viewer shows nothing for the five-word string.) But it predates Livingston's book. See for example item 706 (“New York School and Its European Influence", New York Observer, 4:43, 26 November 1990, p. 21) within this bibliography of criticism by A D Coleman. -- Hoary (talk) 09:25, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

PS Google Books shows that Gilles Mora's PhotoSpeak: a guide to the ideas, movements, and techniques of photography, 1839 to the present (Abbeville, 1998; ISBN 0789200686) has an entry for "New York School". A little piece about Howard Greenberg in March–April 1995 American Photo (here) briefly mentions the NYSP. And perhaps The Photography Encyclopedia (by Gloria S. McDarrah, Fred W. McDarrah, Timothy S. McDarrah; Schirmer, 1999; ISBN 9780028650258) has something on p.140. -- Hoary (talk) 13:49, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

PS The article Lisette Model says (without citing any source) that Model had, or participated in, the exhibitions

1985 "The New York School Photographs: Part One" - Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., "The New York School Photographs: Part Two" - Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.

But (even if this is verifiable) it might refer to New York School for Social Research, where Model taught.

I notice MacDonald Moore and Deborah Dash Moore, "Observant Jews and the photographic arena of looks" (here at Google Books), in Vincent Brook, ed, 'You Should See Yourself': Jewish Identity in Postmodern American Culture (Rutgers UP). But a quick look suggests that a lot of it is derived from Livingston and Kozloff. -- Hoary (talk) 07:40, 1 October 2015 (UTC)