Marvin E. Newman Photographer #bio #superstar-photographer + Edith's Gebratenes Sauerkraut

"Roseland Ballroom" is a single photo which looks like a collage or multiple exposure. Newman’s colorful night photo of Times Square “neon” in New York City.

Marvin took a series of photos, titled "Shadows", as a young artist on the streets of Chicago in 1951.

Newman broke new ground with color photos in the 1950s, when black and white ruled the medium. His compositions used "color" as the conceptual “subject”, showing Burgoyne Diller's influence on his work. This photo was shot at Coney Island in the 1950s using Kodachrome (transparency) film. Color prints, at that time, were fugitive (meaning the colors shifted and faded over time) thus were not a collectable art medium. Kodachrome slides kept their brilliant color, but had to be stored in the dark. Archival color printing first happened in the seventies with an expensive dye transfer process and more recently with pigmented inks for professional, archival digital prints.

The photographer spent some quality time one-on-one with Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) at his gym. This portrait of Clay is also a self portrait. The "posters" in the background were actually props from a boxing movie starring actor Anthony Quinn.

High contrast film, made for document reproduction, was used in a series of art photos, including this 1954 photo of a snow fence.

As a part of an assignment from Esquire Magazine on the NY Stock Exchange, this photo was shot by Marvin through a hole in the ceiling.

Marvin captured #9, Bill Mazerowski, hitting the home run that won the 1960 World Series for Pittsburg. A perfect sports photo showing the "decisive moment”: the batter is still swinging; about to run; you see the ball in the air headed out of the park; and the scoreboard telling it all.

His famous photos of President Kennedy’s funeral were not a part of any assignment, but were taken own his own, because he was personally moved by the tragic event. These photos were picked up by LOOK Magazine and published as a part of their coverage of a nation grieving.

One of Newman’s vintage photographs.

ART:

Marvin E. Newman

Photographer as Artist

Have you ever been seated on a plane next to a person you didn't know and after an interesting conversation, you find you have just met one of those "Interesting Characters" you only meet a few times during a lifetime? The story of how I met photographer Marvin E. Newman is very similar. I was introduced to Marvin and his family at our condominium's social gatherings and over time, at various get-togethers, we would talk about his life and his career. The following article is a condensed version of Marvin's stories, as told to me in those many casual conversations and in one formal interview.

Marvin E. Newman, today.

Marvin E. Newman is indeed a great photographer: photojournalist; art photographer; advertising photographer; photo essayist (books); and sports photographer. He has won the Gold Medal for photography from the New York Art Director's Club, as well as most of the photographic industry's other top honors. Two years ago he was awarded the "Lucie Award" at Alice Tully Hall in New York’s Lincoln Center, for being a "Legendary Photographer". Past Lucie Award honorees have included Henri Cartier-Bresson, Gordon Parks and many other greats. (The Lucie Awards are an annual ceremony honoring the greatest achievements in photography. Each year the global photography community pays tribute to the most outstanding photographers of the world. Marvin E. Newman was honored for his sports photography.)  

Sports Illustrated, in their July, 26 1999 issue, recognized Newman as taking the "The 20th Century's Greatest Sports Photograph!" Wow! Sports subjects are a natural for Marvin, because sports have always been one of his talents and passions. As a photographer he is comfortable around athletes, he relates to them and knows what they go through. This empathy has made all of the difference in his access, professional relationships and has led to his extraordinary sports photographs.

Moment Of Truth

There is no sports action in this photo of the TCU locker room

at halftime against Syracuse in the 1957 Cotton Bowl,

but what Marvin Newman captured in this moment was "the essence of sports".

Sports Illustrated chose this picture as

 "The 20th Century's Greatest Sports Photograph".

Back in the locker room, a roomful of young men from Texas Christian University are trying to stop the best football player in history, a fellow from Syracuse by the name of Jim Brown, in his last college game and his second game to be nationally televised. "We picked this, out of all the crackerjack sports pictures we might've chosen, as our favorite of the century.... You can walk around inside this picture in a way you can't in those others, peer right inside the tunnel these boys have entered. Their boxer shorts are hanging right there, on the hooks behind their heads, but their faces are showing something even more personal than that. Almost reminds you of a painting by Norman Rockwell. Can you smell it? No, not the... (sweaty uniforms), or the cigar reek wafting off the coach, Orthol Martin.... It's the smell of men about to go to war." (Marvin says, because coaches want "NO DISTRACTIONS" at this critical moment, this is a scene few photojournalist witness, but his quiet 35mm Lieca and his athletic ability to become rigidly still while using a mono-pod was his secret to making this “existing light” photo, using a very "slow" Kodachrome color film.) No "The 20th Century's Greatest Sports Photograph" was not an action shot at the World Series or a feat of athleticism at the Olympics or of a star athlete. Sports Illustrated’s editors concluded, "The older you get, the more you realize that this is what sports are most about: the moments before... when a person takes a flashlight to his soul and inspects himself for will and courage and spirit.... Who am I? And, Is that going to be enough?" Yes, TCU won the day.

Marvin Elliott Newman was born in the Bronx, NYC in 1927.  His father owned a bakery and expected his son to help him in the bakery after high school, figuring he would eventually take over the operation. Luckily for the art world and for sports fans this was not his choice.

Marvin was an athlete (football and track) but his grades suffered from his concentration on sports. He first signed up for art classes in an effort to raise his grades. By the time he entered Brooklyn College in 1946, at the age of 16, he was very enthusiastic about art, especially sculpture. Brooklyn College, a NYC school, had become a refuge for Bauhaus artists who had escaped the Nazis in Europe by moving to New York City during World War II. In the college's art department, Marvin was surrounded by some of the greatest artists of the time. His main instructor was Burgoyne Diller, who had headed up the WPA. Although not a Bauhaus artist, Diller had studied under Hans Hoffman. He took Marvin under his wing and taught him geometric abstraction, based on the De Stijl movement. This intense design training under Diller had a huge influence on Marvin and resulted in the strong sense of balance, composition and color in his photography.

As a prerequisite for Diller’s sculpture class, Newman was required to take photography. Teaching this course was the famous photographer Walter Rosenblum, known for his WWII D-Day photographs. Walter was a major player in New York's Photo League (started by Paul Strand and Bernice Abbot). Rosenblum encouraged Marvin to join the Photo League and to start taking "socially conscious" photographs. His Photo League membership also came with access to a professionally equipped b&w dark room, located in New York's Hotel Albert. The young student immersed himself in photography, using every spare minute to take pictures with his twin lens reflex Rollei and to spend whole nights making prints in the b&w photo lab.

After graduation, Diller recommended Newman for graduate school and for a scholarship at Chicago's Institute of Design, another "New Bauhaus" school started by Moholy-Nagy, with the backing of Chicago industrialist Walter Paepke. Marvin had no money, so he hitch-hiked to Chicago and got a job parking cars at night and on weekends to pay for his room, board and supplies. The artist's focus was now only on photography, studying under master practitioners Harry Callahan and Aaron Siskind. Callahan and Siskind are known as two of the innovators and inventors of contemporary photography in America. Callahan encouraged his students to get out on the streets and turn their cameras on their own personal lives and neighborhoods. Newman still considers Harry Callahan as the gold standard in photography and the most influential mentor in his life and career. In 1953, Marvin E. Newman became the first student ever to earn a Master of Science Degree in Photography in the United States.

Newman returned to New York City and soon his work was selected to be in a show organized by Edward Steichen at the Museum of Modern Art. In the “Always the Young Stranger” MoMA show, Marvin exhibited his "Shadows" series. 

Now a professional photographer, he did his first editorial work for SPORT magazine until Sports Illustrated hired him away the same year. From that day until the present (Sports Illustrated called during our formal interview.) Marvin has worked for Sports Illustrated and all of the the TIME-LIFE and now TIME-WARNER magazines, as one of their stable of freelance photographers.

For his entire career Newman has had unprecedented access to many of the greatest events of the last half of the 20th century, especially sporting events. From the Olympics, to the World Series, to the best of NFL Football, to the most famous boxing matches, Marvin E. Newman has been there: close to the action, with an eye for drama, a steady hand and with his camera.

Below are two interesting stories Newman shared with me.

1) Marvin photographed a different NFL game every week of the season. Before the digital age, he had to fly back to Chicago with the film, so Sports Illustrated could develop it and place the photos into the magazine, before the giant presses started printing on Sunday evening. (The magazine was printed by R.R. Donnelley & Sons Press in Chicago.) One day, at a game in San Francisco, the last flight to Chicago left at 2:30 pm and kick-off was at 1 pm. About 2 pm he finally captured a photo, worthy of publication and he had a police car waiting to take him to the airport. He jumped into the police car, then with sirens blaring and lights flashing the officer took him on a 100 mile per hour ride, flying over the hills and through the air, dodging and swerving around cars and trucks on the freeway! Marvin was petrified, but he made his flight. The magazine, with his photo inside, was on the newsstands that week, appearing as if it was all so easy.

2) In the summer of 1960, Marvin was working in the Time-Life Paris office. One day he, his camera and telephoto lenses went to a sunny beach full of beautiful women wearing the newest French fashion statement, bikinis. He took two pictures of each swimsuit. The first, a close up of the tops and the second a close up of the bottoms. He matched them up as sets and sent the pictures off to Playboy Magazine to see if they would be interested. After a week or more he had heard nothing, so he called the Art Director to see if the photos had been received. The AD said he had not seen them, but would look for them. When the AD called back he said he had found them, Hefner had them laid out on his bed and he loved them! The AD wanted to know if Marvin would accept $10,000 for the reproduction rights, plus their page rate? Playboy ran the series on six consecutive color pages!

POSTSCRIPT:

Marvin E. Newman's resume.

Plus more of his photographs.

Education:

Brooklyn College, Economics, Design (Art) Bachelor of Arts 1949. 

    Burgoyne Diller, Walter Rosenblum.

Illinois Institute of Technology, (Institute of Design, New Bauhaus) Chicago.

Master of Science in Photography 1951.

    Harry Callahan, Aaron Sisskind.

Prizes, fellowships, awards, honors:

1st Prize American Photography Magazine. 1950

1st Prize Time Life Contest 1951

New York Art Directors Gold Medal for Editorial Photography 1966

Professional Achievement Award, Illinois Institute of Technology 2006

ASMP National President (The American Society of Media Photographers) 1983

Lucie Award for Photographic Achievement in Sports 2009

Representation in collections:

The Museum Of Modern Art, New York

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

The Art Institute of Chicago

The National Gallery, Washington, DC

Eastman House Museum, Rochester

International Center of Photography, New York

The Hallmark Collection, Kansas City

The Whitney Museum, New York

The Houston Museum, Texas

The Columbus Museum, Ohio

Galleries:

Bruce Silverstein, New York

Stephan Daiter, Chicago

Previous gallery affiliations:

Keith de Lellis, New York

Arthur Williams, New York

Roy de Carava, New York

Art shows:

• 2010 "Beyond COLOR." Participant, group show. Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York, NY.

• 2010 "Discoveries." Participant, group show. Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York, NY.

• 2010 "Passing the Torch:: The Chicago Students of Callahan and Siskin." Participant, vintage photography show. Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago, IL.

• 2009 Lucie Award for Achievement in Photography. “Marvin E. Newman and Yasuhiro Ishimoto” Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago, IL.

• 2008 “Marvin E. Newman: The Color Series.” Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York, NY.

• 2006 “Marvin E. Newman: The First Decade.” Bruce Silverstein Gallery, New York, NY.

• 2000 One man show, “Marvin E. Newman, Seven Photo Essays” Keith de Lellis Gallery, New York.

• 2000 “American Photographs 1900/2000” Assouline Publishers; two published photographs

• 1999 “Newman and Ishimoto, Reunion in Chicago: Photographs from 1949-1952”. Two man show at Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago, Illinois.

• 1998 “New Acquisitions Exhibition”. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

• 1997 One man show, “Shadows 1951”. B/W photography. Keith de Lellis Gallery, New York.

• 1996 “Chicago Photography 1935-1965”. Major contributor. James Danziger Gallery, New York.

• 1995 “Institute of Design”. Contributor, photography show. Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, Illinois.

• 1995 “New York Stories”. Major contributor, photography show. James Danziger Gallery, New York.

• 1994 “Hallmark Collection”. Book and Exhibition. The Art Institute of Chicago. I C P Midtown, New York.

• 1992 “Paris, France”. One year residency, color photography for The Image Bank, subsidiary of Eastman Kodak

• 1989 “Life through the Sixties”. Participant, photo exhibit. International Center of Photography, New York.

• 1988 “The Image Bank”. Worldwide Picture agency. Contract photographer.

• 1987 “Christie’s Inc.”, Fine Art Auctioneers. National advertising photography.

• 1986 “Statue of Liberty,100 Years”. Time Magazine, photographic color supplement.

• 1985 “42nd Street at Night”. Popular Photography, June issue. Photographic color portfolio.

• 1984 “New York at Night”. Stewart Tabori and Chang publishers. Full color portfolio of Times Square in the 1950’s.

• 1983 “American Society of Magazine Photographers”, President. Led cultural delegation to China as a guest of the Chinese government.

• 1982 “Manhattan”. Participant, color photographic show. The Museum of the City of New York.

• 1982 “J.P. Morgan Bank”. 1982-1987. National advertising photography.

• 1981 “Breaking Ground, Open Spaces Temporary and Accidental”. Photographs by Marvin E. Newman, text by Brendan Gill. One man show. Municipal Art Society of New York.

• 1973  Arthur Williams Gallery, New York

• 1956 Roy de Carava’s A Photographers Gallery New York

• 1953 Always the Young Stranger, Museum of Modern Art

Media in which you have worked:

Photography

Sculpture

Books published:

Newsweek Books,

“The Dome of the Rock” 1972, “Vienna” 1981, “The Danube” 1979

Bonniers Publishing, “Color of Sweden” 1966

Abrams Books, “Yankee Colors” 2009

Occupations:

Art Photographer

Magazine Photographer

Advertising Photographer

Journalist

© All images in the above section above are copyright Marvin E. Newman.

ARTS & FOOD, ARTS and FOOD, ARTSnFOOD, ARTSandFOOD.com. All rights reserved. Concept & Original Text © Copyright 2011-2018 Jack A. Atkinson under all International intellectual property and copyright laws. Images © individual artists, fabricators, respective owners or assignees.

Photographs associated with this story on Marvin E. Newman are © Copyright Marvin E. Newman and are the exclusive intellectual property of the artist, all rights reserved. These images were used with his permission. For information please contact the artist directly or Bruce Silverstein Gallery in NYC, or Getty Images Worldwide. (No use, file transfer or image storage in any form is granted without permission.)

FOOD

Sauerkraut:

It is hard to imagine that the fermented state of a vegetable is more delicious and contains more nutrients than the same vegetable in its natural state, but sauerkraut does! It is also very plentiful and affordable. Cabbage is vitamin-rich vegetable with folic acid and phytonutrients which help to boost the body’s immune system. Research shows that vegetables from the cruciferous family (those whose flower forms in the shape of a cross) all appear to be very rich in anti-oxidants – thus a great defense against cancer.

Have the Germans known something for a long time that the rest of the world is just now learning? Cabbage (one of the world’s oldest cultivated vegetables) is very healthy. Many people, even some who are not German, think cabbage has the best flavor when made into sauerkraut!

Below are a few recipes:

Edith's Gebratenes Sauerkraut 

(Fried Sauerkraurt with Onions, Apples & Champagne, Original recipe courtesy of Edith Oswald.) 

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tbsps Vegetable Oil
• 8-10 strips of Bacon cut into 1" sections (or 1 Square of Smoked Bacon: 3"- 4")
• 1 tsp Juniper Berries (Wachhholderbeeren)
• 1/4 tsp Caraway Seeds (Kuemmel)
• 1 Sweet Apple, shredded
• 1 tsp Honey
• 1 lb "wine" sauerkraut
• 1 Yellow Onion, chopped
• 3 1/3 oz. (100ml) Champagne (or sparkling wine)
•     1/4 cup water

DIRECTIONS

1.     Fry onion and bacon in oil. Onions should not get brown.

2.     Shred apple and add all other ingredients along with 1/4 cup of water (enough water so the kraut does not burn).

3.     Cook on the stovetop for 45 to 60 minutes.

4.     Pour in the champagne and cook a few minutes more.

Sauerkraut #2 

The following is a simple sauerkraut recipe that delivers a seriously flavorful tang and texture. A great addition to any pork meal.

Ingredients

• 1 28 oz jar or can sauerkraut
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 tbsp bacon grease
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp Sweet Paprika
• 1/4 tsp Hot Paprika

Directions:

Rinse and drain sauerkraut thoroughly. Set aside. In a large pot, heat bacon grease and sauté onions just until they start to sweat. Add paprika and allow to bloom for a few minutes. Continue cooking until the onions are translucent, then add the sauerkraut, stirring constantly with a large wooden spoon. Cook for 10-20 more minutes, depending on how much water is in the sauerkraut.

Serving Suggestions: Good with Fried Pork Butt, Pork Ribs, Pork Chops & Fresh Home-Made German Pork Sausage.

Until later,

Jack

ARTS & FOOD, artsandfood.com, artsnfood. All rights reserved. Jack Atkinson Studios LLC. Concept & Original Text © Copyright 2011 - 2018 Jack A. Atkinson under all International intellectual property and copyright laws. Images © individual artists, fabricators, respective owners or assignees.