Andreas Feininger

Andreas Feininger was born in France, raised in Germany, and studied photography in Sweden. Inspiring his study of photography was the Bauhaus movement in Germany. Feininger’s father, Lyonel, was a painter in the Bauhaus and raised Andreas in the creative environment of the time. 

Before the outbreak of World War II Feininger immigrated to New York, where he took some of his most famous pictures of the urban landscape. He worked for Life magazine from 1943 to 1962, completing an astounding 346 assignments. He also wrote about photography, publishing the well-known manual, The Complete Photographer, as well as 30 books. 

In 1966, Feininger received the highest distinction, the Robert Leavitt Award, from the American Society of Media Photographers. Before his death in 1999, he received the Infinity Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Center of Photography. His work lives on in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the National Gallery of Art, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the George Eastman House.