John Szarkowski died Saturday at the age of 81. The New York Times obituary outlines the amazing influence he had on photography as an art.
Fortunately, I had the opportunity to spend some time with Szarkowski in August, 1994, in a workshop in Oaxaca, Mexico. The Workshop was organized by Geoff Winningham. Although Szarkowski was listed as one of the instructors for the workshop, actually he was along for a vacation in Mexico. But he did look at every one's portfolio and he talked about photography. I wish at that time that I would have known as much about photography as I know now. I'm sure I would have appreciated and understood much more of what he had to say.
Szarkowski was as eloquent a speaker as he was a writer and about a year ago I had the opportunity to hear him speak about his life and photography when the retrospective of his photography was at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas.
John Szarkowski, Rest in Peace
2 comments:
An era that I feel very linked to and ground in has passed.
P'taker
His was very close to Ansel Adams, as I recall.
Jerry
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