Bill Brandt

Bill Brandt aka William Brandt (born May 3, 1904 - died December 20, 1983) is a British photographer known for portraits of British community, landscape, and Nudes, in black and white images of contrasts.


Youth

Bill was born in Hamburg, Germany, from the father of English descent and mother of German descent. Bill as a child grows in an atmosphere of World War I. In his youth Bill contracted Tuberculosis and was sent for treatment to a sanatorium in Davos, Switzerland.


In 1927 Bill met with Dr. Eugenie Schwarzwald who introduced him to Ezra Pound, who in 1930 introduced him to Man Ray, an American photographer Dada and Surrealist flow are known. Bill then became assistant to Man Ray for some time afterwards.

Early Career Photography




In 1933 Bill moved to London and began photographing the subject of many British community in the documentation format. Documentation of this type have not been common at that time. Collection of photographs are then published in the English book At Home in 1936. Subjects in this documentation ranging from elite neighborhood in the city of London, to house in the slums. To provide a contrasting picture, Bill chose a portrait of the elite to the home front cover and a portrait of the slum houses on the back cover.
At this time Bill is a regular contributor to the magazine Lilliput, Picture Post, and Harper's Bazaar.


The following project is A Night in London, published in 1938. The project was themed images of London at night. Bill a lot of experimenting with photo-Floods, a type of portable tungsten lights in the project.
One thing that really impressed him was berrjudul cinema films Citizen Kane by Orson Welles. Bill inspired by the technique of "deep focusing 'in cinema films which he later used in a nude photo projects.


During World War II, Bill got a job lot of UK Ministry of Information to document anti-air raid protection facilities are located underground city of London. Another thing that Bill is trying to just rely on shooting the moon above the buildings in the city of London, especially when the city lights turned off for the German air raids during the night. Bill said that the buildings of the city of London looks even more beautiful during darkness.


"When I found a portrait of the landscape that I want then I wait until the right season, the weather is right, whether it's the right time of day or night, to get the images exactly as I want", Bill Brandt.
He waited several years to be able to photograph Stonehenge is coated with snow. The photos were then published on the front cover of Picture Post on 19 April 1947.
Bill during his career also made many portraits of famous persona persona. The camera he used is a Rolleiflex with the movie 2.25 in x 2.25 in, view camera with ultra wide lenses, and Hasselblad with a wide angle lens.

Post-World War II

Post-World War II, Bill made a lot of landscapes and portraits British buildings which were later published in 1951. Most of the subjects of the photograph is the home of literary figures who lived in the UK.


In addition to the landscape, Bill began to explore the nude photos with Hasselblad cameras. Wide angle lens is used and unusual shooting angles create nude images of typical distorted Bill Brandt. Often the images of the nude human body parts as if transformed into a landscape. Subjects in the photographs of his own wife and fotomodel professional.

Bill books published include Perspective of Nude in 1961 was followed by a compilation of the best work of Bill in the Shadow of Light in 1966.
The atmosphere is recorded in the photographs are mostly surealist Bill, melancholy, and tend to dim. In general, Bill is seen as one of Britain's most important photographers of the 20th century.