Hayman Jefferson

Jefferson Hayman is an artist whose work explores the themes of nostalgia, common symbols, and memory. Drawing from his education in fine arts and his training in the art of frame-making, Hayman approaches his work with a deep understanding of traditional craftsmanship and a sense of artistic heritage whilst remaining tied to the present through the timelessness of aesthetic simplicity. Through an understated language of visual symbols and meditative studies, Hayman's work manifests as a visual journal chronicling transformation, discovery, and solitude, boldly stripped of the extraneous. Each photograph is handcrafted as a silver gelatin, platinum or pigment print, capturing a delicacy in tonality reminiscent of early Pictorial photography as well as the subsequent modernism movement's refined interplay of light and shadow. Finished prints are paired with antique or artist-made frames, meticulously custom-made by Hayman, whose attention to the unique attributes of each photograph imbues every piece with a completely unique story and sense of personality. Hayman's work is found in numerous private and public collections, notably the Museum of Modern Art Library, The Boston Athenaeum, The New York Public Library, the collection of Sir Elton John, and the collection of Robert DeNiro, amongst many others. In 2015, Hayman was awarded the prestigious Pollock Krasner grant. He lives and works in Tappan, New York, a small historic village minutes from the heart of Manhattan.

Find a broad range of photography on 1stDibs today.

The first permanent image created by a camera — which materialized during the 1820s — is attributed to Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. The French inventor was on to something for sure. Kodak introduced roll film in the 1880s, allowing photography to become more democratic, although cameras wouldn’t be universally accessible until several decades later. 

Digital photographic techniques, software, smartphone cameras and social-networking platforms such as Instagram have made it even easier in the modern era for budding photographers to capture the world around them as well as disseminate their images far and wide. 

What might leading figures of visual art such as Andy Warhol have done with these tools at their disposal?

Today, when we aren’t looking at the digital photos that inundate us on our phones, we look to the past to celebrate the photographers who have broken rules as well as records — provocative and prolific artists like Horst P. Horst, Lillian Bassman and Helmut Newton, who altered the face of fashion and portrait photography; visionary documentary photographers such as Gordon Parks, whose best-known work was guided by social justice; and pioneers of street photography such as Henri Cartier-Bresson, who shot for revolutionary travel magazines like Holiday with the likes of globetrotting society lensman Slim Aarons.

Find photographers you may not know in Introspective and The Study — where you’ll read about Berenice Abbott, who positioned herself atop skyscrapers for the perfect shot, or “conceptual artist-adventurer” Charles Lindsay, whose work combines scientific rigor with artistic expression, or Massimo Listri, known for his epic interiors of opulent Old World libraries. Photographer Jeannette Montgomery Barron was given a Kodak camera as a child. Later, she shot on Polaroid film before buying her first 35mm camera in her teens. Barron's stunning portraits of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Warhol and other artists chronicle a crucial chapter of New York’s cultural history.

Throughout the past two centuries, photographers have used their medium to create expressive work that has resonated for generations. Shop a voluminous collection of this powerful fine photography on 1stDibs. Search by photographer to find the perfect piece for your living room wall, or spend some time with the work organized under various categories, such as landscape photography, nude photography and more.