Photographers From The Same Period

• Garry Winogrand: 'I photograph to see what the world looks like in photographs.' A true New Yorker, Garry Winogrand photographed the streets and the people of New York. He documented American Life in the early 1960s and his best known work belongs in his The Animals (1969) collection. Shot in the Bronx Zoo, it contains images that play on the connections between humans and animals.The photograph below caused a lot of controversy when it was first unveiled to the public eye as racial issues were a serious problem in 1960s America.

Winogrand died in 1984 but left behind 300,000 unedited images and 2,500 undeveloped rolls evidence of his passion for photography and life.

• Diane Arbus was born in 1923 in New York. Arbus is known for her images of 'freaks'. Throughout her career, she photographed dwarfs, giants, circus performers and nudists. In 1955, she took part in the Family of Man exhibition and in 1963 she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship where she was commissioned to document American rites, manners and customs.

Among her most famous images is the photograph titled: Child with Toy Hand Grenade in Central Park (1962). Sadly, having suffered from depression throughout her life, Diane Arbus committed suicide in 1971 at the age of 48. If you wish to follow up reading about Arbus and her work, I recommend Susan Sontag's essay 'America, Seen Through Photographs, Darkly' in her book On Photography (Penguin, 1977). However, it is necessary to keep in mind that Sontag's view is considered narrow and overly critical as many more praised Arbus for her work. In 1972, Robert Hughes congratulated Arbus for having 'altered our experience of the face.'