Diane Arbus
Diane Arbus was a distinct American photographer widely known for her black and white images of people such as dwarfs and giants, mentally retarded individuals, triplets, transvestites and nudists. She traveled the city, photographing those who lived on the edge of society. She was fascinated by people who were clearly creating their own identities.
Diane Arbus was born Diane Nemerov to a wealthy Jewish family in New York City on March 14, 1923. She was the second of three children, between her elder brother Howard Nemerov, a prize-winning poet and her younger sister Renee Sparkia, who became a sculptor and designer. Her father, David Nemerov was a very successful businessman. He married Gertrude Russek, whose family had started Russek's Fur store which later became Russek's of Fifth Avenue under David's management. At the age of fourteen Diane met Allan Arbus, who was nineteen, working in the art department of Russek’s. They became deeply involved with each other and fell in love. Although her parents did not approve of their affair, Diane and Allan continued to meet in secrecy for the next four to five years. Soon after Diane turned 18, they were married by a rabbi on April 10, 1941. Faced with reality, her parents gave their blessing to the marriage. They were married for twenty-eight years, and had two children Doon and Amy Arbus. Although Diane and Allan separated after nineteen years, Allan continued to be a emotional support in her life. It was Allan who introduced Diane to photography, when her father gave the couple their first job making advertisement photographs for his store. Allan always encouraged Diane to take her own photos and creativity, but she began to hate the world of fashion photography and start...
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...ntral Park, 1962, Female impersonators' dressing room, N.Y.C. 1958, and the Identical twins, Roselle, N.J., 1967. Arbus tried to make a living from magazines while still following her style and interest, and succeeded to some extent. However, she was suffering from depression, her need for money at in her work, and committed suicide in her apartment on July 26, 1971.
In conclusion, although Arbus was given a lot of public attention and criticized for being exploitative, she changed how the world viewed photographs. She created a unique depiction of the city with her unusual images, showing the world how mad and beautiful the people of New York were in the 1950’s and 60’s.
Works Cited
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/14/magazine/arbus-reconsidered.html
http://www.biography.com/people/diane-arbus-9187461
Http://jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biograpy/arbus.html
...oyd. She started acting again to tell the story of her spying. She died on stage because of a heart attack. She died at age 56.
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Isadora Duncan who was born in the late 1870’s in San Francisco, was raised alongside three siblings by her mother alone. This may possibly be what led her to become in her own time what we today would considered to be a feminist. She fought against the many restrictions placed on women in her personal life as well as in her form of dance. Because she was such a feminist, Isadora Duncan was strongly opposed to marriage. For this reason both of her children were born out of wedlock, each with a different father. Duncan unfortunately lived a life filled with tragedy. Both of her children died alongside their nanny when a car that thy three were seated in, rolled into a river. Grief-stricken by the death of her children, Isadora’s dancing career was temporarily put on hold until she finally opened up a dance school. She later met a Russian man whom she fell in love with and married in order to be able to bring him to the United States. When she arrived in the United States with her new husband, she was unwelcome because of the fear that the Americans had for the Soviet Union at the time. Angrily, she left the United States vowing to never return again. Subsequently, her husband, who was not well mentally, loft her and eventually he committed suicide. Isadora Duncan’s life came to an end in a fittingly tragic manner when her scarf became entangled in the wheels of a car in which she was riding pulling her out the window of the car and strangling her as she was dragged down the street to her death.
“While I drew, and wept along with the terrified children I was drawing, I really felt the burden I am bearing. I felt that I have no right to withdraw from the responsibility of being an advocate.” – Kathe Kollwitz.
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Marrs, Suzanne. Eudora Welty(tm)s Photography: Images into Fiction. Critical Essays on Eudora Welty. W. Craig Turner and Lee Emling Harding. Boston, MA: G.K. Hall, 1989. 288-289.
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Sonya Kovalevsky was born on January 15, 1850 in Moscow, Russia. She grew up in a very intellectual family. Her father was a military officer and a landholder; her mother was the granddaughter of a famous Russian astronomer and an accomplished musician. She grew up living a lavish life, and was first educated by her uncle, who read her fairy tales, taught her chess, and talked about mathematics. She even bumped into the subject of trigonometry while studying elementary physics. She achieved all of this by the age of thirteen.
There is one thing all hidden children of the holocaust have in common, silence. Lola Rein Kaufman is one of those hidden children. And she is done being silent. Lola Rein was a hidden child during the holocaust. She was one of the lucky ones; one of the 10,000- 500,000 that survived. Her family wasn’t as lucky. Lola endured, los, abandonment, and constant fear, but has now chosen to shed her cloak of silence.