ANDREAS FEININGER
American
A photographer forLifemagazine for 20 years,
Andreas Feininger created some of the most iconic
images of modern America. His view of Coney
Island on the July Fourth holiday (1949) congested
with a sea of celebrants and a photograph of the
car- and pedestrian-clogged Fifth Avenue in Man-
hattan (1950) conveyed the kinetic and chaotic life
of city dwellers in the mid-twentieth century. The
1951 picture of photojournalist Dennis Stock hold-
ing a camera in front of his face has become a
symbol of the unique marriage between camera
and photographer. Building upon themes explored
first atLife, Feininger focused his later work on
nature, in particular on the geometric structures
and patterns common among forms such as leaf
veins, shell spirals, and forest growth.
Born in Paris in 1906 to American artist Lyonel
Feininger, Andreas and his younger brother T(heo-
dore) Lux Feininger (a painter and photographer)
traced their early artistic influences to the Bauhaus
in Germany, where Lyonel taught in the 1920s. At
the avant-garde institution, Feininger studied cabi-
netmaking and took a photography class from
Walter Peterhans, yet he recalled teaching himself
how to experiment with form, technique, and sub-
ject matter, no doubt inspired by La ́szlo ́ Moholy-
Nagy who lived in the same duplex as his family.
By the late 1920s, Feininger published photographs
through the Dephot photo agency, and he had
several photos included in the landmark 1929 exhi-
bitionFilm und Fotoat the Deutsche Werkbund in
Stuttgart, Germany.
After acquiring a degree in architecture from the
Anhaltische Bauschule zu Zerbst in 1928, Feininger
worked as an architect for firms in Dessau and
Hamburg until 1932, when his American citizen-
ship prohibited him from legal employment in Ger-
many. He briefly worked for the architect Le
Corbusier in Paris, then moved to Stockholm
where he found employment as a photographer
for architectural businesses. There he married Ger-
trud Wysse Ha ̈gg, with whom he had one son,
Tomas, born in 1935. While in Sweden Feininger
published a few photography books, including
Stockholm(1936), which featured images of ships
and barges in the city’s port, andNew Paths in
Photography(published in English, 1939), which
presented some experimental work.
Increasingly challenged to find work, by 1939
Feininger moved his family to New York, where
he quickly secured commission assignments from
the Black Star photo agency andLifemagazine. In
1942 the U.S. Office of War Information hired Fei-
ninger to shoot a series on the country’s factories
producing weapons and instruments for the war.
The next yearLifemagazine hired Feininger as a
staff photographer—a position he held until 1962.
AtLife, Feininger completed more than 340 assign-
ments, many of which he initiated himself. With a
straightforward, realistic style, Feininger captured
the dynamism of New York, the abstract beauty of
factories and manmade landscapes, and the fasci-
nating world of insects. The Dennis Stock image
was part of a photo essay on working people and
their equipment, such as a welder with a protective
helmet or a diver with a face mask.
In addition to his work forLife, Feininger wrote
articles on technique and aesthetics forPopular
Photography(1949–1950) andModern Photography
(1957–1969 and 1969–1972). He published several
books and was included in a number of exhibitions,
notablyThe Family of Manat the Museum of Mod-
ern Art (1955) as well as a one-person exhibition
titledThe Anatomy of Natureat the American Mu-
seum of Natural History (1957).
Feininger’s nature subjects became his obsession.
After quittingLifein 1962, Feininger devoted him-
self to creating photography books intended to ins-
pire appreciation and environmental action on the
part of the reader. ThusTrees(1968),Shells(1972),
andLeaves(1984) promote the beauty and variety
of species andForms of Nature and Life(1966),
Nature Close Up(1977), andIn a Grain of Sand
(1986) explore the interrelatedness of natural
forms, from a snake’s skeleton to mineral deposits
in a rock specimen. He typically shot inanimate
objects in his studio at home, with minimal back-
ground and usually in close-up. In the landscape,
Feininger took non-sentimental photos of trees,
tightly cropped images of bark, and gripping shots
of insects devouring each other. Feininger worked
with color photography as early at the 1950s, and heFEININGER, ANDREAS