Minor Martin White
author · photographer
Minor Martin White was a prominent American photographer, theoretician, critic, and educator who significantly influenced creative photography in the mid-20th century. Born in Minneapolis, he studied botany at the University of Minnesota before dedicating his life to photography. He is known for his technical mastery of light and shadow, as well as his philosophical approach to the medium, which included concepts like 'equivalence'—the idea that a photograph can represent something other than its literal subject matter. White was a founding member and long-time editor of Aperture magazine. He taught at various institutions, including the California School of Fine Arts and the Rochester Institute of Technology. His work often explored landscapes, people, and abstract subjects, frequently incorporating personal reflections on sexuality, spirituality (including Zen meditation), and the creative process.[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30]
- equivalence
- pre-visualization
- spiritual photography
- landscape photography
- abstract imagery
Books
Works by Minor Martin White
- 1978 Rites and Passages Contains photographs and writing by White with a biographical essay by James Baker Hall.
- 1947 Amputations A photographic sequence including text from his journals.
- 1947 Song Without Words A personal body of work depicting a model.
- 1948 The Temptation of St. Anthony Is Mirrors A personal body of work depicting a model.
- 1949 City of Surf A series of urban street photographs inspired by Walt Whitman.
- 1955 Rural Cathedrals Landscape images from upstate New York shot on regular and infrared film.
- 1959 Return to the Bud A major exhibition and sequence of photographs.
- 1960 The Sound of One Hand A photographic sequence.
- 1963 Out of My love for You I Will Try to Give You Back Yourself A photographic sequence.
- 1965 Slow Dance A color slide sequence inspired by Gurdjieff's rhythmic rituals.
- 1974 Totemic Sequence A sequence exploring the reality and unreality in a photograph.
Exhibitions
- 1942 First one-man exhibition
- 1954 Camera Consciousness
- 1954 The Pictorial Image
- 1954 Lyrical and Accurate
- 1959 Return to the Bud
- 1968 Light7
- 1970 Be-ing without Clothes
- 1972 Octave of Prayer
- 1974 Celebrations
References
- Lee Gallery. Minor White 1908–1975. link
- Hall, Minor White: Rites and Passages.
- Ibson, John. Men without Maps: Some Gay Males of the Generation before Stonewall.
- Bunnell, Minor White: Rites and Passages.
- Hall, Minor White: Rites and Passages.
- White 1969, 233.
- Ibson, John. Men without Maps: Some Gay Males of the Generation before Stonewall.
- White 1969, 234.
- Hall, 21.
- Bunnell, 4.
- Hall, 16.
- Comer, 20–24.
- Hill Jan 1977, 40.
- Comer, 28–30.
- Bunnell, 6.
- Hill Feb 1977, 37.
- Gee, Helen (1997), Limelight : a Greenwich Village photography gallery and coffeehouse in the fifties : a memoir.
- Gassan, 108–114.
- Hall, 40.
- Bunnell, 47.
- Bunnell, 9.
- Hill Feb 1977, 39.
- Bunnell, p10.
- Bunnell, 11.
- Daido Loori.
- Hall, 136.
- White, 1970.
- Bunnell, 12–13.
- Frajndlich, 12–16.
- Hall, 39.