What's that photo?

[Chris101]

"a ugly" - I think spell check got me - I think I was saying "a guy"

Not to worry - I just thought it was funny. Say what you will about the subject of this picture, but "ugly" is not a good description of the person in the photo. This thread is the first reference I've heard to it's being a self portrait.

The picture is of Dennis Stock, not a selfie of Feininger. Their ages: Feininger was 45, Stock was 23. Look at the ear: Feininger's were closer to his head and convex from the front, Stock's stood out and were concave from the front. Check the lobes too: detached vs semi-attached. Look at the nose shape as well. The subject is obviously not Feininger himself. Feininger took several self portraits around the same time. You can tell it is not the same person.

 

[sevo]

Hundreds of attributions and titles aside, it cannot be mirror self-portrait for technical reasons - there are several versions, each with the lens at a slightly different angle, in some cases noticeably pointing outwards. In a mirror selfie, the mirror and lens would be consistently in parallel (or very slightly inclined towards the image axis, if off-centre).

 

[Chris101]

Hundreds of attributions and titles aside, it cannot be mirror self-portrait for technical reasons - there are several versions, each with the lens at a slightly different angle, in some cases noticeably pointing outwards. In a mirror selfie, the mirror and lens would be consistently in parallel (or very slightly inclined towards the image axis, if off-centre).

True, but a self portrait can be made while holding one camera, and taking a photo with a different camera. Although I do believe the many statements that this is Stock, and none* that it is a selfie, the fact that it doesn't look like Feininger clinches it for me.

* As suggested, I did a google search for the filename under jsrocket's post of the picture, as well as follow the link of the picture back to it's source. Google found two instances of the picture being labled "andreasfeiningerselfportrait.jpg". One was this very thread. The other was prolific blogger Gerald Boerner's post that the picture is linked from. While the file is called andreasfeiningerselfportrait.jpg, the blog post correctly identifies it as Feininger's portrait of Dennis Stock. Jsrocket's link did not state it WAS a self portrait, but only that that was the name of the file he linked to.

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

A woman in need of a shave...

PF

Well caught. 🙂

I found a large print of it in the Time-Life Library volume "The Camera" (page 61) and it does look more like a young male when I see it at that size. So it may well be Stock.

 

[Chris101]

I knew I had this, and finally found it! From The Creative Photographer by Andreas Feininger, second edition (1975 - originally published in 1955), on page 35:

It's not the same picture, but appears to have been made contemporaneously by Feininger, of the same subject. The book is written by Feininger himself, so this is just about as close as I can get to a statement from the artist.

ps, my current avatar is inspired, no, copied from Feininger's famous photo. Mine however, is a selfie.

 

[farlymac]

And Dennis appears to be older in this version.

PF

 

[Chris101]

That clever Feininger. Just to trick us.