2000 Reflections in a Glass Eye: Works from the Interna-
tional Center of Photography Collection; International
Center of Photography, New York
Selected Works
Me ́xico, D.F. (Mexico City), 1972
Pollos (Chickens), Juchita ́n, Oaxaca, 1979
Mujer Angel (Angel Woman), Sonora, 1979
Nuestra Sen ̃ora de las Iguanas,(Our Lady of the Iguanas),
Juchita ́n, Oaxaca, 1980
La tienda (The Store), 1982
Magnolia, Juchita ́n, Oaxaca, 1986
Cholas con Zapata y Villa en East L.A., (1986)
Cementerio (Cemetery), Juchita ́n, Oaxaca, 1988
Further Reading
Harris, Melissa, ed.Aperture: On Location With: Henri Car-
tier-Bresson, Graciela Iturbide, Barbara Kruger, Sally
Mann, Andres Serrano, Clarissa Sligh. New York: Aper-
ture Foundation, 1995.
Iturbide, Graciela.External Encounters, Internal Imagings:
Photographs by Graciela Iturbide. San Francisco: San
Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1990.
Iturbide, Graciela.Images of the Spirit. New York: Aper-
ture Foundation, 1996.
Iturbide, Graciela.Juchita ́n de las mujeres. Intro and text by
Elena Poniatowska. Mexico: Ediciones Toledo, 1989.
Iturbide, Graciela.La forma y la memoria. Monterrey, Mex-
ico: Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Monterrey, 1996.
Iturbide, Graciela.Suen ̃os de pape. Mexico: Fondo de Cul-
tura Economica, 1985.
Medina, Cuahhtemoc.Graciela Iturbide (Phaidon 55S).
New York: Phaidon Press, 2001.IZIS (ISRAEL BIDERMANAS)
French, born in Lithuania
Izis Bidermanas is one of the most important
French photographers, who unfortunately has
been greatly underestimated. His career started at
the end of World War II, when he portrayed his
resistance comrades in Limoges. By the time he was
included in the popular 1955 exhibition, The
Family of Man, at the Museum of Modern Art,
New York (MoMA), he had joined the staff of
Paris-Match, specializing in photographs of pain-
ters, artists, and writers. He published several
photography art books collaborating with artists
and poets from Paris and its poorer quarters, dis-
covering astonishing formal relations between
objects and people. After leavingParis-Matchin
1969, he worked as a freelance photographer until
his death in 1980.
He was born in Marijampole in Lithuania on
January 17, 1911. Although Bidermanas had
shown interest in painting at an early age, he left
school at age 13 to be an apprentice to a portrait
photographer in that city. After living the life of a
gypsy, wandering the countryside to photograph,
he ended up, penniless and speaking no French, in
Paris in 1930 at age 19. As apprentice to a portrait
photographer, Bidermanas had learned techniques
of soft focus and retouching, both of which he later
rebelled against, calling them untruthful. In Paris,
he worked first in a laboratory, retouching photo-
graphs and printing. He was employed by the
photographer Arnal and later directed a small pho-
tography shop in the 13th arrondissement in Paris,
before opening his own studio in 1934 and produ-
cing portraits.
During World War II he became a member of
the resistance movement, photographing his com-
rades and working as a photo researcher. After the
war he became a French citizen (1946) and worked
as a freelance photographer before joining the staff
ofParis-Match. Remaining with the magazine for
over 20 years, he focused on photographs of pain-
ters, poets, and writers. He was known to stroll the
city of Paris as a dreamer, searching for moments,
which ‘‘aroused his curiosity, moved him or made
him reflect.’’
Following the German invasion of France in 1940
Bidermanas, as a Jew, was forced to flee and hide; he
supported himself retouching photos. It was during
this time he took on his pseudonym, Izis. He ended
up in the Limoges in 1944, fighting as a soldier
during the liberation of the town and where heIZIS (ISRAEL BIDERMANAS)