Bill Brandt

Bill Brandt was a German born British photographer whose stark black and white images defined much of twentieth century British photography. In the 1930s he documented the social contrasts of Britain, contrasting the lives of the wealthy with the industrial poor of the north, and photographed London during the wartime blackout for the Home Office. After the war his work turned toward portraiture of writers and artists and toward a series of nudes, Perspective of Nudes, shot with a wide angle camera that distorted the body into abstracted, sculptural forms. Brandt is regarded as one of the most important photographers Britain produced, admired both for his documentary eye and for the theatrical, high contrast printing style he developed later in his career.