Hi! I'm trying to find out the name of a photographer who did a large number of photographs of either Pittsburgh or Detroit in the 1950's. I remember from an article that he had a number of eccentric habits, among them was critiquing the prints his assistants were making from his music while he sat outside the darkroom, listening to blaring classical music. Before he made his photographs, he would research the place, talking to people, etc., and he probably wouldn't bring a camera along.

Ring any bells? Thanks for any help. I've been going nuts with the search engines and no luck.

-- Brian C. Miller (a-bcmill@exchange.microsoft.com), September 21, 1998

Answers

If I'm not mistaken, and I very well could be, I believe that W. Eugene Smith did a big project that was centered around Pittsburg, and he always listened to music while he worked. I'm don't recall what his use of assistants was when he printed, but he seemed to be eccentric in his ways, and a genius in his images. Maybe a Smith devotee can clarify this.

-- Marv Thompson (mthompson@clinton.net), September 21, 1998.

I agree with Marv as W. Eugene Smith came to mind immediately. He did some very detailed and large projects in Pittsburgh around that time for LIFE magazine. His research was very thorough and he was obsessive about every detail of the whole project including the text. Even if this was not him I encourage everyone to look up his large format views of Pittsburgh's industrial landscape as they are beautiful.

-- Andy Laycock (agl@intergate.bc.ca), September 26, 1998.

Brian,

Go here, http://www.doubletakemagazine.org/issues/12/smith/index/index.html, for Doubletake Magazine's excellent coverage of W. Eugene Smith's Pittsburgh project.

Enjoy,

Jon

-- Jon J. Eilenberg (jon.eilenberg@westgroup.com), September 28, 1998.

Lots of luck finding large format views of Pittsburg's industrial landscape by W. Eugene Smith. He was strictly a 35mm man.

-- Dave Jenkins (ljenkins@vol.net), January 01, 1999.

The Magnum history book ("50 years on the front line of History" is the full title, I believe) has a great chapter on Smith. Eccentric is an understatement!

Doug

-- Doug hughes (Doug.Hughes@Grace.com), January 07, 1999.

I heard someone say Eliot Xxxxxx (somebody) was the wit of photographers... I haven't found any Eliots....

Any Clues? Eliot Who

-- Oliver Joy (olsjoy@aol.com), January 13, 1999.

That would be, er, Eliot Erwitt.

-- Alan Gibson (Alan.Gibson@technologist.com), January 14, 1999.