The Wit Photographer - Elliot Erwitt • Research

  Elliot Erwitt was born in 1928 in Paris. However, he spent the rest of his childhood in Milan, and in 1939 he and his family moved to the US. He has been interested in photography since he was a teenager and worked in a commercial darkroom. He was famous for his black-and-white photos. Even though his works have been taken from a long time ago, his work has always become memorable and inspiring to other or new photographers.

Elliot Erwitt: Sequentially Yours

    The picture that Erwitt took is one of the works he published in his book, "Sequentially Your". The photo shows a sequence image with a tragic event in which the guy swings the girl and accidentally drops the girl. The embarrassment of this picture makes this picture draw attention to how the sequence is created to make a story. A quote says, "he lets his photos do the talking" (The Guardian, 2020). 

Elliott Erwitt: Retrospective Miscellaneous. 1992.

    The picture is in the Retrospective album that Elliot Erwitt took in his early 40s. Others have believed that he is an amusing photographer. We can find it in this quote: "Erwitt's unmistakeable, often witty, style gives us a snapshot of the strange and the mundane over a period of more than half a century, through the lens of one of the era's finest image-makers." (International Photography Magazine, 2015).

Italy. Trieste. 1949. Photograph: Elliott Erwitt/Magnum Photos

   The image was taken in 1949. This picture shows how the picture is simple and seems chaotic, even though there seems to be a lot going on in the background, like smoke and a guy with a suit doing something. However, the photo's focal point shows that everything is calming and fine. Besides calming, Erwitt stated that photography is uncomplicated stuff to do, "Photography is pretty simple stuff." (The Guardian, 2020). However, we know that he has been interested in photography since he was a teenager, but he also mentioned, "I'm not enthusiastic, I just take pictures." (The Guardian, 2020).

    References:

Elliot Erwitt • Photographer profile • magnum photos magnum photos (no date) Magnum Photos. Available at: https://www.magnumphotos.com/photographer/elliott-erwitt/ (Accessed: 05 October 2023).

Elliott Erwitt: ‘photography is pretty simple. you just react to what you see’ (2020) The Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2020/nov/09/elliott-erwitt-interview-photographer (Accessed: 05 October 2023).

Elliott Erwitt: Retrospective (2015) Elliott Erwitt: Retrospective | International Photography Magazine. Available at: http://photogrvphy.com/elliott-erwitt-retrospective/ (Accessed: 05 October 2023).