He is an American born French photographer and filmmaker, born in New York City. Firstly he used unusual photographic techniques in photojournalism and fashion photography. Using wide angle and telephoto shots on models outside of the studio setting. Then became widely acknowledged as an innovator in the history and design of photo books, through publish of his first book 'life is good and good for you', 1956. In this photo she captured the rough and tumble of daily life. His brutally honest images caused a sensation, leading to 3 more books published from different cities: Rome (1958 – 59), must scale (1964) and Tokyo (2014). In these books he used the idea of 'The decisive moment' by Henri Cartier - Bresson.
References
1) Howard Greenberg Gallery, William Klein, http://www.howardgreenberg.com/artists/william-klein, last assessed 24/09/19.
2) Wikipedia, 2019, William Klein, (photographer),
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Klein_(photographer)
Huxley
parlour, Nina + Simone, Piazza Di Spagna, Rome (Vogue), 1960, [https://huxleyparlour.com/works/nina-simone-piazza-di-spagna-rome-vogue-1960/]
This photo is taken from his time at Vogue magazine, before the books about daily life in the cities were published. In this photo the model is walking down a zebra crossing, leading the viewer's eyes to follow her movement like she is able to walk out of the picture. For this time this was a very unconventional thing as it wasn't staged within a studio but taken outside in the moment on the streets. This almost gives the impression or idea of 'this is what you can look like if you wear this outfit'.
Huxley parlour, Atom Bomb Sky New York 1955, [https://huxleyparlour.com/works/atom-bomb-sky-new-york-1955/]
This next photo shows the skyline of New York City, whether empire state building is clearly visible and is always spotlighted by the background. Taken from his first photo book 'life is good and good for you', shows the viewer of image how beautiful and complex New York city looks from a high vantage point.The enormous light (the sun) lights up the city from behind creating a cast shadow as well as allowing the viewer to see into the vast distance/the horizon.
Courtesy HackelBury Fine Art, New York, 1954 – 55.
[https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/oct/19/photographers-on-photobooks-nan-goldin-juergen-teller-martin-parr]
From the first book, this is the most famous photo. It shows Henri Cartier-Bresson's idea of the decisive moment perfectly. As the viewer can see the image is fully straight and therefore taken at that exact second in time. He shows people in mid movement going about their day, where he has been spotted the man in the black suit has smiled. This captures the feeling of busyness as he and the man in front of him both remove movement and supposedly kept going even after this photo was taken. A photo is also not framed perfectly as the building or pavement is not straight therefore shown that this was not set up or predicted.
Influence
Summary
The influence from this photographer was quite small however led into a large part of what my work would entail in the end. This allowed me to adapt this idea that photos aren't always perfect and its ok to have some that are off angle the second example image of the photographer shows this.
His approach to composition led to the development of my idea on using the camera itself as the movement for the photo. This gave me amazing effects and a new technique when taking photos. However I unlike the photographer I didn't shoot in black and white in that shoot.
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