Iconic American photographer Bruce Davidson began taking photographs at the age of ten and continued to further his knowledge and develop his passion through his university years. He was later drafted into the army and stationed near Paris, where he met Henri Cartier-Bresson, one of the founders of the renowned cooperative photography agency, Magnum Photos. After leaving military service, Davidson worked as a freelance photographer for LIFE magazine and in 1958 became a full member of Magnum. From 1958 to 1961 he created such seminal bodies of work as “The Dwarf,” Brooklyn Gang,” and “Freedom Rides.” In 1962 he received a Guggenheim fellowship to create a profound documentation of the civil rights movement in America. In 1963, the Museum of Modern Art in New York presented his early work in a solo show.

Davidson received the first grant for photography from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1967, having spent two years witnessing the dire social conditions on one block in East Harlem. This work was published by Harvard University Press and later became an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 1980, he captured the vitality of the New York Metro’s underworld that was later published in a book, Subway, and exhibited at the International Center for Photography.

Davidson’s awards include the Lucie Award for Outstanding Achievement in Documentary Photography in 2004 and a Gold Medal Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Arts Club in 2007. Classic bodies of work from his 50-year career have been extensively published in monographs and are included in many major public and private fine art collections around the world. He continues to photograph and produce new bodies of work.

Courtesy of Magnum Photos