Boris Lipnitzki (1887–1971) was a Russian Empire-born French photographer of the arts; ballet, fashion, cinema, visual art, writing and music.

Biography

Haim Efime Boris Lipnitzki (or Lipnitzky) was born into a Jewish family in Oster, in Chernihiv Province of the Russian Empire (now Ukraine) on 4 February 1887. He died in Paris on 6 July 1971, aged 84, and is buried in Pere Lachaise cemetery.[1]

Photographer

Boris Lipnitzki (1920s) Benjamin Rabier
Boris Lipnitzki (c.1934) Olga Spessivtseva in ballet costume

Lipnitzki first worked for a photographer in Odessa, then opened his own studio in Pultusk. He arrived in Paris in the early 1920s. There, he established a studio at 40 rue du Colisée, where he photographed many of the artistic personalities of the 20th century from the 1920s-1960s,[2] as well as picturing them in their own surroundings. His friendship with fashion designer Paul Poiret, with whom he would stay to photograph in Biarritz, provided an entrée into these circles.[3]

His subjects included Maurice Ravel, René Hubert, Albert Camus, Blaise Cendrars,[4] Jean Cocteau, Otto Preminger, Igor Strawinsky, Arthur Honegger,[5] Leonid Massine, Serge Lifar, Paul Poiret, Coco Chanel, Olga Spessivtseva, Nyota Inyoka, Tamara Karsavina, Serge Gainsbourg, Les Six, Marc Chagall, Pablo Picasso,[6][7] as well as Josephine Baker of whom in 1926 he made a famous series of nude photographs.[8]

Lipnitzki was a stills photographer on Gance's Napoléon and caught more informal views of crew and actors relaxing,[9] his pictures being used on the covers of the programs and displayed in cinemas, but despite assurances, he was not given credit for them. A trial followed in the Seine tribunal and the producer of the film was ordered to pay 30,000 francs (about US$16000 in 2010) to Lipnitzki. The industry publication Le Photographe called attention to this as a precedent in French copyright law.[10] He also recorded many major ballet performances and made studio portraits of dancers.[11]

Photographs by Lipnitski were published in Femina, The Paris Times, Paris-Alger magazine, Les Modes, La Vie parisienne, Chantecler revue, Vogue (Paris), L'Atlantique, Paris-soir, La Femme de France, Être belle, Le Photographe, Le Point, Adam: revue des modes masculines en France et à l'étranger, Ambiance, Comoedia, Claudine, Le Monde illustré, L'Art musical, Bravo, Le Petit journal, Le Théâtre et Comœdia illustré and others.[12]

In an article on the relative value of hand-drawn and photographic illustration, Robert Lang director/editor of Rester Jeune, describing the stylistic of various illustrators and photographers, writes of Lipnitzki that he "is fond of halos and his art parallels that of the theatre".[13]

Lipnitzki's prodigious output was decimated when the Athenaeum theatre, where his friend Louis Jouvet had helped him hide his prints during the Occupation was flooded while he had fled to stay with his friend Chagall in New York .

Post-war

After the war, he and his brothers established the Lipnitzki Studio which was in full production and by 1946 was advertising for staff,[14] and operated until just before Lipnitzki died.[15] In the mid-50s, his nephew Bernard Lipnitski joined the studio for three years, before being hired by weekly magazine France Dimanche, for which he photographed Céline Monsarrat, Françoise Sagan and Salvador Dali, then was employed as a photojournalist by other French magazines.[16] Boris Lipnitzki continued to agitate for copyright law in relation to professional photography and his opinion and participation was sought, amongst other instances, by the meeting of Commission des Droits d'Auteur of February 1945, and on other occasions.[17]

Legacy

In 1970, his collection—more than a million negatives and 600,000 prints—and that of his nephew, was bought by the Roger-Viollet agency.[18] Attribution of images from the studio made 1945–1969 to a particular photographer amongst the brothers is not always certain.

Publications

  • Haim Efime Boris Lipnitzki (1952), Images de Louis Jouvet, Paris Emile-Paul frères, retrieved 1 February 2021
  • Lipnitzki, Boris; Denoyelle, Françoise (2013), Boris Lipnitzki : le magnifique, Chaudun, ISBN 978-2-35039-140-3

Solo exhibitions

  • 2005, 7 May – 12 Jun: Boris Lipnitzki, Espace Saint-Jean, Melun

Group exhibitions

Collections

References

  1. ↑ Beauvis, Charlette. (1992). Le columbarium du Père-Lachaise : la crémation, son histoire, sa pratique, son avenir. Langlade, Vincent. Paris: Editions Vermet. ISBN 2-86514-022-9. OCLC 30318883.
  2. ↑ CARIGUEL, OLIVIER. Revue Des Deux Mondes, 2012, pp. 182–183. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44193291
  3. ↑ "La Côte basque : revue illustrée de l'Euzkalerria ["puis" de l'Eskual-herria]". Gallica. 1927-09-11. Retrieved 2021-02-03.
  4. ↑ Max Blagg: On Boris Lipnitzki's 1953 Portrait of Blaise Cendrars. (2009). Aperture, (195), 88-88. Retrieved February 1, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/24473440
  5. ↑ Arthur Honegger (1892-1955). Autograph score: Arioso pour Violon et Piano. 2 leaves. Undated. Given by the composer to the Paris photographer Efim Boris Lipnitzki (1887-1971). Dedication: „à Lipnitzki en très amical souvenir et avec mes remerciements pour les belles photos. A. Honegger”
  6. ↑ CARIGUEL, OLIVIER. Revue Des Deux Mondes, 2012, pp. 182–183. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44193291
  7. ↑ Besse, Brigitte (2011), Portraits pour un siècle : cent écrivains, Gallimard : Roger-Viollet, ISBN 978-2-07-013194-5
  8. ↑ Jules-Rosette, Bennetta. (2007). Josephine Baker in art and life : the icon and the image. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0-252-03157-1. OCLC 64442908.
  9. ↑ "Agence Roger-Viollet : Napoleon seen by Abel Gance". The Eye of Photography Magazine. 2021-02-01. Retrieved 2021-02-01.
  10. ↑ Le Photographe : organe des photographes professionnels, Société Photovision (Paris) No.233, 5 January 1929, p.16
  11. ↑ "Past to Present : Photos by Boris LIPNITZKI". www.past-to-present.com. Retrieved 2021-02-01.
  12. ↑ "Boris Lipnitski - magazine publications search - Gallica". Gallica. Archived from the original on 2021-02-07. Retrieved 2021-02-04.
  13. ↑ Robert Lang, "Drawings? Photographs? How to illustrate women's magazines: the moral to draw from a controversy without conclusion", Presse publicité: hebdomadaire technique de toute la presse, No.19, 12 September 1937, p.3
  14. ↑ advertisement, Le Photographe : organe des photographes professionnels, Société Photovision (Paris), no.633, 6 October 1946
  15. ↑ Roger-Viollet Agency. "Boris Lipnitzki". Roger-Viollet. Archived from the original on 2021-02-08. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  16. ↑ Roger-Viollet Agency. "Bernard Lipnitzki". Roger-Viollet. Archived from the original on 2021-02-07. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  17. ↑ "Commission des Droits d'Auteur, Séance du 12 février 1945", Le Photographe: organe des photographes professionnels, No.622, 20 April 1946, p66-7
  18. ↑ "Boris Lipnitzki photographs held by the Roger-Viollet Photo agency". Roger-Viollet. Archived from the original on 2021-02-05. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  19. ↑ "musée Nicéphore Niépce - 1925-1935, une décennie bouleversante". www.museeniepce.com. Retrieved 2021-02-01.
  20. ↑ Hommage à Claire Croiza : [ exposition, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale], Département de la musique, 15 juin-1er septembre 1984 / [catalogue par Jean-Michel Nectoux] 1984
  21. ↑ André Barsacq : cinquante ans de théâtre : [ exposition, Paris], Bibliothèque nationale, [17 juin-1er octobre] 1978 / [catalogue par Marie-Françoise Christout, avec la collab. de Noëlle Guibert]; [préf. de Georges Le Rider] 1978
  22. ↑ Guy Ropartz : [exposition, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, 11 juin-11 juillet 1964] / catalogue réd. par Simone Wallon,...; [préf. de Julien Cain] Wallon, Simone. Auteur du texte
  23. ↑ André Veinstein, Julien Cain, Louis Jouvet : exposition organisée pour le dixième anniversaire de sa mort. Bibliothèque nationale; [catalogue ], Paris 1961
  24. ↑ Gustave Flaubert et Madame Bovary : exposition organisée pour le centenaire de la publ. du roman, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, [19 décembre 1957-28 février 1958] / [catalogue réd. par Madeleine Cottin et Jacques Suffel]; [préf. de Julien Cain] 1957
  25. ↑ L'Informateur de la photographie : organe officiel de la Chambre syndicale des fabricants et négociants de la photographie, No.109, March 1930, p.27
  26. ↑ "Lipnitzki Boris - 19251935partie6". collections.museeniepce.com. Retrieved 2021-02-01.
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