A leading photographer of the 20th century - Yousurf Karsh

 

 

Yousuf Karsh (1908 – 2002)

Yousuf Karsh was born on December 23, 1908, in Mardin, Armenia, to Abdel Al Masi Karsh and his wife Bahiyah Yurjosna Karsh. Karsh’s early life was deeply marked by the mass killings of Armenians by the Turks, particularly because his father was arrested and forced into labor during this genocide. However, in 1921, Karsh’s family, along with his three young children, was allowed to flee Mardin to Syria, with only a donkey and their belongings.

In 1923, Bahiyah’s brother, George Nakash, wrote to her from Canada, asking if one of her sons could be sent to work in his photography studio. That fall, at the age of 17, Karsh traveled to Sherbrooke, Canada. Initially, Karsh wanted to study medicine, but in the summer of 1926, he went to work in Nakash’s studio. He quickly became captivated by photography and would take his small camera into the fields and forests around Sherbrooke, encouraged by his uncle.

Nakash then helped Karsh get an apprenticeship with his friend and fellow photographer, John H. Garo, in Boston. Garo, an Armenian colleague, was a respected portraitist, and he encouraged Karsh to study the Old Masters, especially Rembrandt and Velázquez, while also attending night art classes to learn the basics of composition and lighting.

In 1936, Karsh was invited to photograph Franklin D. Roosevelt, the first U.S. president to visit Canada. During this time, Karsh was also introduced to Winston Churchill. Karsh’s famous portrait of Churchill was taken after an initial encounter in which Churchill was irritated by the lighting and attempted to dispose of his cigar. Karsh waited patiently, capturing Churchill’s expression as he removed the cigar, which eventually became one of the most iconic portraits of the British Prime Minister. This photograph, published globally in newspapers and magazines, cemented Karsh’s international fame and established him as one of the world’s most popular photographers.

In early 1943, Karsh traveled to England aboard a Norwegian freighter carrying explosives. Prime Minister Mackenzie King had asked him to photograph key figures of the war to show the world Canada’s participation. During this trip, he made several early classical portraits of figures such as the Archbishop of Canterbury and George Bernard Shaw, which defined his style of using theatrical lighting and revealing portraits through side lighting.

After his travels in England, Karsh embarked on an extensive period of worldwide travel to complete his assignments. He photographed political leaders, diplomats, sports figures, musicians, businessmen, and Hollywood stars. In 1952, he was assigned by Maclean's magazine to document Canada’s economic progress after the war. Over 17 months, Karsh created more than 8,000 images, and 280 of them were published in the magazine.

By the late 1950s, Karsh had become as famous as the figures he photographed. Over the next decade, he captured portraits of the world’s most famous individuals, including Pablo Picasso, Alberto Giacometti, Audrey Hepburn, Ernest Hemingway, and Georgia O'Keeffe. In 1957, he published the book “Great Portraits”, which sold out before its official release at a press event. In 1960, the National Gallery of Canada held a retrospective exhibition of his portraits. However, this success came at a cost—Karsh suffered a heart attack in 1959 due to overwork. That same year, his mother passed away, and Solange, a close relative, was diagnosed with cancer. In 1961, Solange died, and Karsh lost one of his most important supporters.

In 1962, Karsh remarried, this time to Estrellita Mahvar, a medical writer and historian he met during a portrait session in Chicago. In 1987, he donated his photographic negatives, along with his records, to the Canadian National Archives, where his former assistant Jerry Fielder became the curator of the collection. Karsh continued to work well into the 1980s and 1990s. One of his most successful portraits in his later years was of the newly elected U.S. President Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary. His studio remained open until 1992, during which time he photographed all Canadian Prime Ministers after Mackenzie King, every British Prime Minister since Churchill, and U.S. Presidents.

In 1997, Karsh moved to Boston, where he lived in an apartment near an art museum and donated 199 of his portraits to the museum’s permanent collection. On July 13, 2002, he passed away at the age of 93 in Boston. In 2001, he was included in Who’s Who in the 20th Century, a list of the 100 most influential people of the century, being the only Canadian and the only photographer on the list.

 

A Collection of Yousuf Karsh Photographs (Source: Google Images)