The Parisian Crowd
Berenice Abbott, Portrait of Tsugouharu Foujita, 1927, printed 1982, gelatin silver print. The Clark, gift of A&M Penn Photography Foundation by Arthur Stephen Penn and Paul Katz, 2007.2.397
Beginning in 1925, Berenice Abbott quickly built a reputation as a top portrait photographer in Paris. She started taking portraits of her friends, which later expanded to include friends of friends. In the span of about a year, she went from being an anonymous American expatriate to a destination in her own right; famous personalities, especially members of the artistic and literary avant-garde, began to seek Abbott out to have their portraits taken in her signature sharp style.
On the genre of portrait photography, Abbott wrote in her 1941 book, A Guide to Better Photography: “The maker of great portraits will have to have a burning curiosity which probes beneath the flesh to the bone and beyond that to the soul of the sitter. He may romanticize or dramatize a person, but in no petty spirit. The essence of the portrait is humanity, its meaning, all its thoughts, emotions, characteristics. How a person’s life speaks through his eyes, the modelling of his cheekbones, the weight of his body as he sits or stands, are subtle nuances, without which portraiture is mechanical and lifeless.”
