Folly: Elliott Erwitt

Elliott Erwitts is a photographer born in the 1920's famous for his black and white pictures.
Born in France to Russian parents he emigrated to America at the age of ten, living first in New York and then moving to Los Angeles. Travel would be be a constant part of his life; he moved between Germany, France and Pittsburgh while serving in the US Army.

While attending Hollywood Highschool he worked in a darkroom, developing prints of famous film stars for fans. In 1949 he travelled through Europe taking photographs for various different publications and thus started his photography career. Mentors like Edward Steichen, Robert Capa and Roy Stryker helped him during his career. After finishing his military career he joined Capa's photography company 'Magnum
Photos'.

Despite a childhood filled with upheaval and war, his photographs view the world from a humorous and witty perspective. He has the "ability to capture the unexpected" and show that the "familiar can still be humorous".

In addition to his photos that have been published extensively he also produced several documentaries "Beauty Knows No Pain", "Red, White and Bluegrass" and "The Glassmakers of Herat".

Quality doesn't mean deep blacks and whatever tonal range. That's not quality, that's a kind of quality. The pictures of Robert Frank might strike someone as being sloppy--the tone range isn't right and things like that--but they're far superior to the pictures of Ansel Adams with regard to quality, because the quality of Ansel Adams, if I may say so, is essentially the quality of a postcard. But the quality of Robert Frank is a quality that has something to do with what he's doing, what his mind is. It's not balancing out the sky to the sand and so forth. It's got to do with intention. - Elliott Erwitt