MINOR WHITE
American
Minor (Martin) White is best known for his faith in
the spiritual and subjective aspects of photography.
Greatly influenced by Alfred Stieglitz’s idea of
equivalence and inspired by a large array of philo-
sophical and religious ideas such as Catholicism,
Zen, Tao, astrology, the teachings of the Russian
mystic G.I. Gurdjieff (1870s–1949), and Jungian
psychology, White approached photography as a
means of self-discovery and self-growth. He be-
lieved that the mythical quality of reality and of
self could be accessed through photography.
White’s contribution to photography extends well
beyond his own work as a photographer. Through-
out his lifetime, he devoted himself to achieving
broad public recognition for photography as an art
form by introducing the work of many young photo-
graphers to the public, developing higher-education
programs in photography, and publishing exten-
sively on the subject, but it is as a teacher that
White made his greatest impact.
In his teaching, nationwide lectures, and work-
shops, White stressed the need to ‘‘read’’ photo-
graphs and emphasized that the meanings of images
lay somewhere between the image and the viewer.
Essential to his understanding of reading a photo-
graph is the notion of an ‘‘innocence of vision’’—
defined by him as a serious and deliberate effort to
experience the image directly and deeply. In the class-
room, White introduced theatre techniques, classical
music, mime, Zen meditation, and applications of
Gurdjieff’s teaching to help students conceive the
taking and viewing of a photograph as spiritual and
intellectual activities. His bold vision influenced
many photographers, including Peter Bunnell, Paul
Caponigro, Carl Chiarenza, Oliver Gagliani, Wil-
liam Heick, Bob Hollingsworth, Rose Mandel, and
Jerry Uelsmann.
White’s interest in photography can be traced to
1916, when his grandfather gave him a Brownie
camera. White learned to print and develop photo-
graphs as a student of photomicrography at the
University of Minnesota. Once graduated with a
B.Sc. degree in botany and a minor in English
(1933), he moved to Portland, Oregon, worked as
a hotel clerk, was an active member of the Oregon
Camera Club, and taught photography at the
YMCA. In 1938, White was assistant secretary of
the People’s Power League, a position that helped
him secure the title of creative photographer for the
Oregon Art Project commissioned by the Works
Progress Administration’s (WPA) Art Program of
the Federal Works Agency. These early photo-
graphs are architectural studies taken in a direct,
documentary style. In 1940, he completed his first
article on photography entitled ‘‘When Is Photo-
graphy Creative?’’ published three years later in
American Photography. The following year, the
Portland Art Museum hosted his first major one-
man exhibition.
From April 1942 to September 1945, White served
in the U.S. Army Intelligence Corps as an infantry-
man in the Philippines, receiving the Bronze Star.
Although he photographed little during this period,
he completed a manuscript entitledEight Lessons in
Photographythat he incorporated into his later writ-
ings. White also wrote poetry,Elegies,Free Verse for
the Freedom of Speech,andMinor Testament,which
served as text for the 1947 sequence of photographs
Amputations(never exhibited).
White lived in New York City after his discharge
from the Army. He studied museum methods and
worked as a photographer at the Museum of Mo-
dern Art (MoMA), where he befriended Beaumont
and Nancy Newhall. With their help, White was
introduced to a number of photographers, includ-
ing Harry Callahan, Paul Strand, and Edward
Weston. He also studied aesthetics and art history
at Columbia University under Meyer Schapiro who
strongly motivated him to consider a psychological
approach to photography. White began to see a
photograph as meaningful beyond content and
style, a conviction supported by Stieglitz’s idea of
equivalence. White first met Stieglitz in 1946, the
year he moved to San Francisco to join Ansel
Adams in teaching photography at the California
School of Fine Arts (CSFA), today the San Fran-
cisco Art Institute. Although he initially shared
Adams’s approach to photography, their views
significantly diverged as White’s interest in a psy-
choanalytic basis of making and interpreting pho-
tographs increased. For White, the sharp form and
texture of straightforward photography were cer-WHITE, MINOR