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Portrait Photography For Sale
Male nude from the 29 Palms, CA series, 21st Century, Polaroid, Nude Photography

Male nude from the 29 Palms, CA series, 21st Century, Polaroid, Nude Photography

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Male Nude (29 Palms, CA) - 1999, 58x56cm, Edition 6/10. Analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist, based on the original Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inve...

Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Polaroid, Color, C Print, Archival Paper

Five Maiko (Apprentices) Having lunch – Original hand-colored Meiji era photo
Five Maiko (Apprentices) Having lunch – Original hand-colored Meiji era photo

Five Maiko (Apprentices) Having lunch – Original hand-colored Meiji era photo

Located in Middletown, NY

Yokohama, Japan: c 1890. Hand-tinted albumen print, 8 x 10 1/2 inches (203 x 266 mm), numbered B04 in negative, small spots of fixer on lower right corner, pencil inscription on ver...

Category

Late 19th Century Realist Portrait Photography

Materials

Watercolor, Photographic Paper

Little Darlings (Till Death do us Part) - Contemporary, Polaroid, Women

Little Darlings (Till Death do us Part) - Contemporary, Polaroid, Women

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Little Darlings (Till Death do us Part) - 2005 38x37cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 artist proofs. Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inv...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Marilyn Candid Moment - Marilyn Monroe at Ambassador Hotel in New York City

Marilyn Candid Moment - Marilyn Monroe at Ambassador Hotel in New York City

By Ed Feingersh

Located in Brighton, GB

American actress Marilyn Monroe relaxes on the sofa of her suite at the Ambassador Hotel in New York whilst reading 'To the Actor: On the Technique of Acting', the classic guide to a...

Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Black and White, Silver Gelatin

Little Darlings (Till Death do us Part) - Contemporary, Polaroid, Women

Little Darlings (Till Death do us Part) - Contemporary, Polaroid, Women

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Little Darlings (Till Death do us Part) - 2005 38x37cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 artist proofs. Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inv...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid, Archival Paper

Dining Out - New York Dinner Portrait Couple Dining Black and White Photograph

Dining Out - New York Dinner Portrait Couple Dining Black and White Photograph

Located in Brighton, GB

Dining Out - New York Dinner Portrait Couple Dining Black and White Photograph A couple dining out at an elegant hotel in New York is caught momentarily distracted by the floor show...

Category

20th Century Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Black and White, Silver Gelatin

Sunbathing in Capri, 1974 - Sunbathers on French Island of Capri Summer Bronzing
Sunbathing in Capri, 1974 - Sunbathers on French Island of Capri Summer Bronzing

Sunbathing in Capri, 1974 - Sunbathers on French Island of Capri Summer Bronzing

By Slim Aarons

Located in Brighton, GB

Sunbathing in Capri, 1974 - Sunbathers on French Island of Capri Summer Bronzing by Slim Aarons 16 x 20" print. Limited Edition Estate Stamped Print. Edition of 150. Printed Later. ...

Category

20th Century American Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Digital

Fish and Chips Van Square, Haddenham - English Vintage Countryside Color Photo
Fish and Chips Van Square, Haddenham - English Vintage Countryside Color Photo

Fish and Chips Van Square, Haddenham - English Vintage Countryside Color Photo

By Richard Heeps

Located in Cambridge, GB

A classic British fish & chips van, on a classic English day at Haddenham Steam Rally Country Fair, photograph by Richard Heeps. This artwork is a limited edition of 25 gloss p...

Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Silver Gelatin

Louis Armstrong on Stage - Louis Armstrong Trumpet Player Concert Photograph

Louis Armstrong on Stage - Louis Armstrong Trumpet Player Concert Photograph

Located in Brighton, GB

Louis Armstrong on Stage - Louis Armstrong Trumpet Player Concert Photograph World renowned trumpeter and jazz musician Louis Armstrong is photographed on stage during a concert. 1...

Category

20th Century Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Black and White, Silver Gelatin

Couple at Party - Black and White Romantic Couple Silver Gelatin Photograph

Couple at Party - Black and White Romantic Couple Silver Gelatin Photograph

Located in Brighton, GB

Couple at Party - Black and White Romantic Couple Silver Gelatin Photograph A couple relaxes and laughs on a spacious sofa on the terrace of a villa. The party is still in full swin...

Category

20th Century Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Black and White, Silver Gelatin

Alice Topping (1959) Limited Estate Stamped

Alice Topping (1959) Limited Estate Stamped

By Slim Aarons

Located in London, GB

Alice Topping (1959) Limited Estate Stamped (Photo By Slim Aarons) Socialite Alice Topping by a swimming pool in Palm Beach, Florida, 1959. Additional Information: Unframed ...

Category

1960s Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Color, Archival Pigment

Dining In Gstaad, Switzerland, Estate Edition, Mid-Century Modern Photograph
Dining In Gstaad, Switzerland, Estate Edition, Mid-Century Modern Photograph

Dining In Gstaad, Switzerland, Estate Edition, Mid-Century Modern Photograph

By Slim Aarons

Located in Los Angeles, CA

This early 1960s landscape photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features holidaymakers at a ski lodge at Gstaad, Switzerland, March 1961. This is an estate stam...

Category

1960s Realist Portrait Photography

Materials

Lambda

David Bowie - The Pack by Markus Klinko

David Bowie - The Pack by Markus Klinko

By Markus Klinko

Located in Austin, TX

New Release - January 2026 "David Bowie - The Pack" New York, 2001 Museum quality fine art print of David Bowie by photographer Markus Klinko, from his celebrated collection "Bowie...

Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

My Girl (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

My Girl (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

My Girl (Till Death do us Part) - 2005 20x20cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs, Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inventory #92...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Parchment Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Winter Wear, Cortina d'Ampezzo, Estate Edition, Mid-Century Modern Photograph
Winter Wear, Cortina d'Ampezzo, Estate Edition, Mid-Century Modern Photograph

Winter Wear, Cortina d'Ampezzo, Estate Edition, Mid-Century Modern Photograph

By Slim Aarons

Located in Los Angeles, CA

This late-1970s photograph, captured by society photographer Slim Aarons, features Manuela Boraomanero (left) and Emanuela Beghelli holiday in the Italian ski resort of Cortina d'Amp...

Category

1970s American Realist Portrait Photography

Materials

Lambda

My Girl (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

My Girl (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

My Girl (Till Death do us Part) - 2005, 20x20cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs, Digital C-Print, based on a Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inventory #9506...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Parchment Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

D. and Felix -  Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative Photography
D. and Felix -  Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative Photography

D. and Felix - Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative Photography

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

D. and Felix (Stranger than Paradise) - 1997 Edition of 2/30. Image size 16 x 21.6 inch, External dimensions: 17.7 x 23.3 inch. Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Mounted...

Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Wood, Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Polaroid

Wild Things (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

Wild Things (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Wild Things (Till Death do us Part) - 2005, 20x24cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs, Digital C-Print, based on a Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inventory #...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Parchment Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Always Sometimes - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Nude

Always Sometimes - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Nude

By Kirsten Thys van den Audenaerde

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Always Sometimes, 2020 50x50cm, Edition of 7 plus 2 Artist Proofs, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, not mounted. Signed on the back and with certificate. Artist inventory - P...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Monuments, Paris

Monuments, Paris

By Sonia Sieff

Located in München, BY

Edition 7 A very beautiful and sexy naked body is lying in front of some very famous monuments of Paris. These stunning photographs of Sieff’s subjects in Paris, in their homes, on...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Love - Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative, Photograph, Nude
Love - Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative, Photograph, Nude

Love - Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative, Photograph, Nude

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Love (The Princess and her Lover) part of the 29 Palms, CA project - 2007, Edition of 1/10, 20x24cm. Digital C-Print based on the Polaroid. Not mounted. Signature label and Cer...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

L'ascension, Paris

L'ascension, Paris

By Sonia Sieff

Located in München, BY

Edition of 7 Also available in 73 x 100 cm / 28.7 x 43.3 in, Edition of 3, price on request A very beautiful and naked woman is stepping up a circular staircase in an apartment in P...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Something (Till Death do us Part) - 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative

Something (Till Death do us Part) - 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Something (Till Death do us Part) - 2005 40x40cm, Edition of 10. Archival C- Print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and signature label. Artist inventory number: 9445. Not mou...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Flora 12 - Baroque Female Nude Photography Floral Interior Design
Flora 12 - Baroque Female Nude Photography Floral Interior Design

Flora 12 - Baroque Female Nude Photography Floral Interior Design

By Tortora & Travezan

Located in Brighton, GB

Flora 12 is a vibrant Digital C-Type print in this size in a Limited Edition of 15 by contemporary photography duo Tortora & Travezan. In this portrait, Tortora & Travezan create a ...

Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Digital, Color

On the Run (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

On the Run (Till Death do us Part) Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

On the Run (Till Death do us Part) - 2005, 24x20cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs, Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inventor...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Parchment Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Male Nude from the 29 Palms, CA series
Male Nude from the 29 Palms, CA series

Male Nude from the 29 Palms, CA series

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Male Nude (29 Palms, CA) - 1999 58x56cm, Edition of 10, analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist on Fuji Crystal Archive paper, matte surface, based on a Polaroid. Signature la...

Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Barricade - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Nude

Barricade - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Nude

By Kirsten Thys van den Audenaerde

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Barricade, 2020 50x50cm, Edition 1/7 plus 2 Artist Proofs, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, not mounted. Signed on the back and with certificate. Artist inventory - PL2020-90...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Sur mes lèvres, Marseille

Sur mes lèvres, Marseille

By Sonia Sieff

Located in München, BY

Edition of 7 Also available in 73 x 100 cm / 28.7 x 43.3 in, Edition of 3, price on request A very sexy extract of a portrait of a naked blond woman with beautiful lips. These stun...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Backstage At La Scala (1948) Limited Estate Stamped

Backstage At La Scala (1948) Limited Estate Stamped

By Slim Aarons

Located in London, GB

Backstage At La Scala (1948) Limited Estate Stamped (Photo By Slim Aarons) A chorus girl reads a movie magazine in a dressing room at La Scala opera house, Milan, November 1948....

Category

1940s Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White, Archival Pigment

Beach at St. Tropez - Topless Sunbathing South of France French Riviera Beaches
Beach at St. Tropez - Topless Sunbathing South of France French Riviera Beaches

Beach at St. Tropez - Topless Sunbathing South of France French Riviera Beaches

By Slim Aarons

Located in Brighton, GB

Beach at St. Tropez - Topless Sunbathing South of France French Riviera Beaches by Slim Aarons 16 x 20" print. Limited Edition Estate Stamped Print. Edition of 150. Printed Later. ...

Category

20th Century American Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Color, C Print, Digital

Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Long Way Home' - signed

Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Long Way Home' - signed

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Long Way Home' - 1999 - signed in front, not mounted. 1 Digital Color Photographs based on a Polaroid. Polaroid sized open Edit...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, C Print, Color, Lambda, Polaroid

From the Hip - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Nude

From the Hip - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Nude

By Kirsten Thys van den Audenaerde

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

From the Hip, 2020 50x50cm, Edition 1/7 plus 2 Artist Proofs, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, not mounted. Signed on the back and with certificate. Artist inventory - PL2020...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Unique portrait of Roy Lichtenstein, Authenticated by the Andy Warhol Foundation
Unique portrait of Roy Lichtenstein, Authenticated by the Andy Warhol Foundation

Unique portrait of Roy Lichtenstein, Authenticated by the Andy Warhol Foundation

By Andy Warhol

Located in New York, NY

Andy Warhol Portrait of Roy Lichtenstein, 1975 Polaroid dye-diffusion print Authenticated by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, bears the Foundation stamp verso Frame included: Framed in white wood frame with UV plexiglass; with die-cut window in the back to show official Warhol Foundation authentication stamp and text Measurements: 9 9/16 x 8 9/16 x 9/16 inches (frame) 3 1/2 x 2 3/4 inches (window) 4.16 x 3.15 inches (Artwork) Authenticated and stamped by the Estate of Andy Warhol/Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts An impressive piece of Pop Art history! A must-have for fans and collectors of both Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein: This is a unique, authenticated color Polaroid taken by one Pop Art legend, Andy Warhol, of his most formidable contemporary and, in many respects, rival, Roy Lichtenstein. One of only a few portraits Andy Warhol took of Roy Lichtenstein, during one tense photo shoot. Both iconic artists, colleagues and, perhaps lesser known to the public, rivals, would be represented at the time by the renowned Leo Castelli Gallery. The truth is - they were really more rivals than friends. (the rivalry intensified when Warhol, who was working with Walt Disney, discovered that Lichtenstein painted Mickey Mouse before he did!!) Leo Castelli was committed to Roy Lichtenstein, and, it's easy to forget today, wasn't that interested in Warhol as he considered Lichtenstein the greater talent and he could relate better with Roy on a personal level. However, Ivan Karp, who worked at Castelli, was very interested in Warhol, as were some powerful European dealers, as well as many wealthy and influential American and European collectors. That was the start of Warhol's bypassing the traditional gallery model - so that dealers like Castelli could re-discover him after everybody else had. Warhol is known to have taken hundreds of self-portrait polaroid photographs - shoe boxes full - and he took many dozens of images of celebrities like Blondie and Farrah Fawcett. But only a small number of photographic portraits of fellow Pop Art legend Roy Lichtenstein -- each unique,- are known to have appeared on the market over the past half a century - all from the same photo session. This is one of them. There is another Polaroid - from this same (and only) sitting, in the permanent collection of the Getty Museum in California. There really weren't any other collaborations between these two titans, making the resulting portrait from this photo session extraordinary. It is fascinating to study Roy Lichtenstein's face and demeanor in this photograph, in the context of the great sense of competition, but perhaps even greater, albeit uneasy respect, these two larger than life Pop art titans had for each other: Like Leo Castelli, Roy Lichtenstein was Jewish of European descent; whereas Warhol was Catholic and quintessentially American, though also of European (Polish) descent. They were never going to be good friends, but this portrait, perhaps even arranged by Leo Castelli, represents an uneasy acknowledgement there would be room at the top for both of them. Floated, framed with die cut back revealing authentication details, and ready to hang. Measurements: 9 9/16 x 8 9/16 x 9/16 inches (frame) 3 1/2 x 2 3/4 inches (window) 4.16 x 3.15 inches (sheet) Authenticated by the Estate of Andy Warhol/The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. Estate Stamped: Stamped with the Andy Warhol Estate, Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts stamp, numbered "B 512536P", with the Estate of Andy Warhol stamp and inscribed UP on the reverse. Bears the Warhol Foundation unique inventory number. Roy Lichtenstein Biography Roy Lichtenstein was one of the most influential and innovative artists of the second half of the twentieth century. He is preeminently identified with Pop Art, a movement he helped originate, and his first fully achieved paintings were based on imagery from comic strips and advertisements and rendered in a style mimicking the crude printing processes of newspaper reproduction. These paintings reinvigorated the American art scene and altered the history of modern art. Lichtenstein’s success was matched by his focus and energy, and after his initial triumph in the early 1960s, he went on to create an oeuvre of more than 5,000 paintings, prints, drawings, sculptures, murals and other objects celebrated for their wit and invention. Roy Fox Lichtenstein was born on October 27, 1923, in New York City, the first of two children born to Milton and Beatrice Werner Lichtenstein. Milton Lichtenstein (1893–1946) was a successful real estate broker, and Beatrice Lichtenstein (1896–1991), a homemaker, had trained as a pianist, and she exposed Roy and his sister Rénee to museums, concerts and other aspects of New York culture. Roy showed artistic and musical ability early on: he drew, painted and sculpted as a teenager, and spent many hours in the American Museum of Natural History and the Museum of Modern Art. He played piano and clarinet, and developed an enduring love of jazz, frequenting the nightspots in Midtown to hear it. Lichtenstein attended the Franklin School for Boys, a private junior high and high school, and was graduated in 1940. That summer he studied painting and drawing from the model at the Art Students League of New York with Reginald Marsh. In September he entered Ohio State University (OSU) in Columbus in the College of Education. His early artistic idols were Rembrandt, Daumier and Picasso, and he often said that Guernica (1937; Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid), then on long-term loan to the Museum of Modern Art, was his favorite painting. Even as an undergraduate, Lichtenstein objected to the notion that one set of lines (one person’s drawings) “was considered brilliant, and somebody’s else’s, that may have looked better to you, was considered nothing by almost everyone.”i Lichtenstein’s questioning of accepted canons of taste was encouraged by Hoyt L. Sherman, a teacher whom he maintained was the person who showed him how to see and whose perception-based approach to art shaped his own. In February 1943, Lichtenstein was drafted, and he was sent to Europe in 1945. As part of the infantry, he saw action in France, Belgium and Germany. He made sketches throughout his time in Europe and, after peace was declared there, he intended to study at the Sorbonne. Lichtenstein arrived in Paris in October 1945 and enrolled in classes in French language and civilization, but soon learned that his father was gravely ill. He returned to New York in January 1946, a few weeks before Milton Lichtenstein died. In the spring of that year, Lichtenstein went back to OSU to complete his BFA and in the fall he was invited to join the faculty as an instructor. In June 1949, he married Isabel Wilson Sarisky (1921–80), who worked in a cooperative art gallery in Cleveland where Lichtenstein had exhibited his work. While he was teaching, Lichtenstein worked on his master’s degree, which he received in 1949. During his second stint at OSU, Lichtenstein became closer to Sherman, and began teaching his method on how to organize and unify a composition. Lichtenstein remained appreciative of Sherman’s impact on him. He gave his first son the middle name of “Hoyt,” and in 1994 he donated funds to endow the Hoyt L. Sherman Studio Art Center at OSU. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Lichtenstein began working in series and his iconography was drawn from printed images. His first sustained theme, intimate paintings and prints in the vein of Paul Klee that poked lyrical fun at medieval knights, castles and maidens, may well have been inspired by a book about the Bayeux Tapestry. Lichtenstein then took an ironic look at nineteenth-century American genre paintings he saw in history books, creating Cubist interpretations of cowboys and Indians spiked with a faux-primitive whimsy. As with his most celebrated Pop paintings of the 1960s, Lichtenstein gravitated toward what he would characterize as the “dumbest” or “worst” visual item he could find and then went on to alter or improve it. In the 1960s, commercial art was considered beneath contempt by the art world; in the early 1950s, with the rise of Abstract Expressionism, nineteenth-century American narrative and genre paintings were at the nadir of their reputation among critics and collectors. Paraphrasing, particularly the paraphrasing of despised images, became a paramount feature of Lichtenstein’s art. Well before finding his signature mode of expression in 1961, Lichtenstein called attention to the artifice of conventions and taste that permeated art and society. What others dismissed as trivial fascinated him as classic and idealized—in his words, “a purely American mythological subject matter.”ii Lichtenstein’s teaching contract at OSU was not renewed for the 1951–52 academic year, and in the autumn of 1951 he and Isabel moved to Cleveland. Isabel Lichtenstein became an interior decorator specializing in modern design, with a clientele drawn from wealthy Cleveland families. Whereas her career blossomed, Lichtenstein did not continue to teach at the university level. He had a series of part-time jobs, including industrial draftsman, furniture designer, window dresser and rendering mechanical dials for an electrical instrument company. In response to these experiences, he introduced quirkily rendered motors, valves and other mechanical elements into his paintings and prints. In 1954, the Lichtensteins’ first son, David, was born; two years later, their second child, Mitchell, followed. Despite the relative lack of interest in his work in Cleveland, Lichtenstein did place his work with New York dealers, which always mattered immensely to him. He had his first solo show at the Carlebach Gallery in New York in 1951, followed by representation with the John Heller Gallery from 1952 to 1957. To reclaim his academic career and get closer to New York, Lichtenstein accepted a position as an assistant professor at the State University of New York at Oswego, in the northern reaches of the state. He was hired to teach industrial design, beginning in September 1957. Oswego turned out to be more geographically and aesthetically isolated than Cleveland ever was, but the move was propitious, for both his art and his career. Lichtenstein broke away from representation to a fully abstract style, applying broad swaths of pigment to the canvas by dragging the paint across its surface with a rag wrapped around his arm. At the same time, Lichtenstein was embedding comic-book characters figures such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck in brushy, expressionistic backgrounds. None of the proto-cartoon paintings from this period survive, but several pencil and pastel studies from that time, which he kept, document his intentions. Finally, when he was in Oswego, Lichtenstein met Reginald Neal, the new head of the art department at Douglass College, the women’s college of Rutgers University, in New Brunswick, New Jersey. The school was strengthening and expanding its studio art program, and when Neal needed to add a faculty member to his department, Lichtenstein was invited to apply for the job. Lichtenstein was offered the position of assistant professor, and he began teaching at Douglass in September 1960. At Douglass, Lichtenstein was thrown into a maelstrom of artistic ferment. With New York museums and galleries an hour away, and colleagues Geoffrey Hendricks and Robert Watts at Douglass and Allan Kaprow and George Segal at Rutgers, the environment could not help but galvanize him. In June 1961, Lichtenstein returned to the idea he had fooled around with in Oswego, which was to combine cartoon characters from comic books with abstract backgrounds. But, as Lichtenstein said, “[I]t occurred to me to do it by mimicking the cartoon style without the paint texture, calligraphic line, modulation—all the things involved in expressionism.”iii Most famously, Lichtenstein appropriated the Benday dots, the minute mechanical patterning used in commercial engraving, to convey texture and gradations of color—a stylistic language synonymous with his subject matter. The dots became a trademark device forever identified with Lichtenstein and Pop Art. Lichtenstein may not have calibrated the depth of his breakthrough immediately but he did realize that the flat affect and deadpan presentation of the comic-strip panel blown up and reorganized in the Sherman-inflected way “was just so much more compelling”iv than the gestural abstraction he had been practicing. Among the first extant paintings in this new mode—based on comic strips and illustrations from advertisements—were Popeye and Look Mickey, which were swiftly followed by The Engagement Ring, Girl with Ball and Step-on Can with Leg. Kaprow recognized the energy and radicalism of these canvases and arranged for Lichtenstein to show them to Ivan Karp, director of the Leo Castelli Gallery. Castelli was New York’s leading dealer in contemporary art, and he had staged landmark exhibitions of Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg in 1958 and Frank Stella in 1960. Karp was immediately attracted to Lichtenstein’s paintings, but Castelli was slower to make a decision, partly on account of the paintings’ plebeian roots in commercial art, but also because, unknown to Lichtenstein, two other artists had recently come to his attention—Andy Warhol and James Rosenquist—and Castelli was only ready for one of them. After some deliberation, Castelli chose to represent Lichtenstein, and the first exhibition of the comic-book paintings was held at the gallery from February 10 to March 3, 1962. The show sold out and made Lichtenstein notorious. By the time of Lichtenstein’s second solo exhibition at Castelli in September 1963, his work had been showcased in museums and galleries around the country. He was usually grouped with Johns, Rauschenberg, Warhol, Rosenquist, Segal, Jim Dine, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Indiana and Tom Wesselmann. Taken together, their work was viewed as a slap in the face to Abstract Expressionism and, indeed, the Pop artists shifted attention away from many members of the New York School. With the advent of critical and commercial success, Lichtenstein made significant changes in his life and continued to investigate new possibilities in his art. After separating from his wife, he moved from New Jersey to Manhattan in 1963; in 1964, he resigned from his teaching position at Douglass to concentrate exclusively on his work. The artist also ventured beyond comic book subjects, essaying paintings based on oils by Cézanne, Mondrian and Picasso, as well as still lifes and landscapes. Lichtenstein became a prolific printmaker and expanded into sculpture, which he had not attempted since the mid-1950s, and in both two- and three-dimensional pieces, he employed a host of industrial or “non-art” materials, and designed mass-produced editioned objects that were less expensive than traditional paintings and sculpture. Participating in one such project—the American Supermarket show in 1964 at the Paul Bianchini Gallery, for which he designed a shopping bag—Lichtenstein met Dorothy Herzka (b. 1939), a gallery employee, whom he married in 1968. The late 1960s also saw Lichtenstein’s first museum surveys: in 1967 the Pasadena Art Museum initiated a traveling retrospective, in 1968 the Stedelijk Musem in Amsterdam presented his first European retrospective, and in 1969 he had his first New York retrospective, at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Wanting to grow, Lichtenstein turned away from the comic book subjects that had brought him prominence. In the late 1960s his work became less narrative and more abstract, as he continued to meditate on the nature of the art enterprise itself. He began to explore and deconstruct the notion of brushstrokes—the building blocks of Western painting. Brushstrokes are conventionally conceived as vehicles of expression, but Lichtenstein made them into a subject. Modern artists have typically maintained that the subject of a painting is painting itself. Lichtenstein took this idea one imaginative step further: a compositional element could serve as the subject matter of a work and make that bromide ring true. The search for new forms and sources was even more emphatic after 1970, when Roy and Dorothy Lichtenstein bought property in Southampton, New York, and made it their primary residence. During the fertile decade of the 1970s, Lichtenstein probed an aspect of perception that had steadily preoccupied him: how easily the unreal is validated as the real because viewers have accepted so many visual conceptions that they don’t analyze what they see. In the Mirror series, he dealt with light and shadow upon glass, and in the Entablature series, he considered the same phenomena by abstracting such Beaux-Art architectural elements as cornices, dentils, capitals and columns. Similarly, Lichtenstein created pioneering painted bronze sculpture that subverted the medium’s conventional three-dimensionality and permanence. The bronze forms were as flat and thin as possible, more related to line than volume, and they portrayed the most fugitive sensations—curls of steam, rays of light and reflections on glass. The steam, the reflections and the shadow were signs for themselves that would immediately be recognized as such by any viewer. Another entire panoply of works produced during the 1970s were complex encounters with Cubism, Futurism, Purism, Surrealism and Expressionism. Lichtenstein expanded his palette beyond red, blue, yellow, black, white and green, and invented and combined forms. He was not merely isolating found images, but juxtaposing, overlapping, fragmenting and recomposing them. In the words of art historian Jack Cowart, Lichtenstein’s virtuosic compositions were “a rich dialogue of forms—all intuitively modified and released from their nominal sources.”v In the early 1980s, which coincided with re-establishing a studio in New York City, Lichtenstein was also at the apex of a busy mural career. In the 1960s and 1970s, he had completed four murals; between 1983 and 1990, he created five. He also completed major commissions for public sculptures in Miami Beach, Columbus, Minneapolis, Paris, Barcelona and Singapore. Lichtenstein created three major series in the 1990s, each emblematic of his ongoing interest in solving pictorial problems. The Interiors, mural-sized canvases inspired by a miniscule advertisement in an Italian telephone...

Category

1970s Pop Art Portrait Photography

Materials

Polaroid

Mona Lisa
Mona Lisa

Mona Lisa

By Larry Moss

Located in New York, NY

Larry Moss has created his amazing air-filled art called “airigami” in 12 countries on four continents. Moss's work with latex balloons makes great art accessible to kids in a fun e...

Category

2010s Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Karine / Contemporary, Color, Photography, Analog, 21st Century, Hollywood

Karine / Contemporary, Color, Photography, Analog, 21st Century, Hollywood

By Tao Ruspoli

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

'Karine', Edition 2/10, 20x30cm, 2018 Art Print on Velvet Watercolor Paper, 310gsm, Bright White, Acid Free Signature label and Certificate. About Tao Ruspoli (born 7 November 1975)...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Color, Archival Pigment

Minnie and Dru Montagu - Couple Poses for Photograph on Sandy Beach under Palms
Minnie and Dru Montagu - Couple Poses for Photograph on Sandy Beach under Palms

Minnie and Dru Montagu - Couple Poses for Photograph on Sandy Beach under Palms

By Slim Aarons

Located in Brighton, GB

Minnie and Dru Montagu - Couple Poses for Photograph on Sandy Beach under Palms by Slim Aarons 16" x 16" print on 16" x 20" paper. Limited Edition Estate Stamped Print. Edition of 1...

Category

20th Century American Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Color, C Print, Digital

Street Games - 1950s English Street Photography Children Playing Games Portrait

Street Games - 1950s English Street Photography Children Playing Games Portrait

By Thurston Hopkins

Located in Brighton, GB

A young boy wearing a feathered Indian-style headdress peers out of a coal hole and aims his pistol at the photographer. Nearby a young friend is dallying on the edge of the paveme...

Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Black and White, Silver Gelatin

1960s Limited Edition Black and White Photograph, Martin Luther King, MLK, 13x19
1960s Limited Edition Black and White Photograph, Martin Luther King, MLK, 13x19

1960s Limited Edition Black and White Photograph, Martin Luther King, MLK, 13x19

By Leonard Freed

Located in New york, NY

Martin Luther King (MLK), 1964 by Leonard Freed is an iconic black and white documentary photograph, a portrait of one of the most influential African American personalities and civi...

Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Archival Ink, Digital, Archival Pigment, Digital Pigment

The Kiss I. Self Nude Portrait Color Photograph.
The Kiss I. Self Nude Portrait Color Photograph.

The Kiss I. Self Nude Portrait Color Photograph.

By Maria José Arjona

Located in Miami Beach, FL

The Kiss was a self-taken photograph and was part of her solo exhibition in New York at the Art Space Location One, in 2012. The Kiss maps a system uniting two bodies. It is a gestur...

Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Color, Archival Pigment

Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Memory of a Dream' - signed
Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Memory of a Dream' - signed

Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Memory of a Dream' - signed

By Stefanie Schneider

Located in Morongo Valley, CA

Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Mini 'Memory of a Dream (29 Palms, CA)' - 2006 - 1 Archival Color Photograph based on the original Polaroid. Polaroid sized open Editio...

Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, C Print, Color, Lambda, Polaroid

Dali And Gala (1955) Limited Estate Stamped

Dali And Gala (1955) Limited Estate Stamped

By Slim Aarons

Located in London, GB

Dali And Gala (1955) Limited Estate Stamped (Photo By Slim Aarons) Spanish artist Salvador Dali (1904 – 1989) enjoying a cup of coffee with his wife Gala (1894 – 1982) on a terra...

Category

1950s Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White, Archival Pigment

Catch Up by the Pool, 1970 - Poolside Conversation, Kaufmann House Palm Springs
Catch Up by the Pool, 1970 - Poolside Conversation, Kaufmann House Palm Springs

Catch Up by the Pool, 1970 - Poolside Conversation, Kaufmann House Palm Springs

By Slim Aarons

Located in Brighton, GB

Catch Up by the Pool, 1970 - Poolside Conversation, Kaufmann House Palm Springs by Slim Aarons 16 x 20" print. Limited Edition Estate Stamped Print. Edition of 150. Printed Later. ...

Category

20th Century American Modern Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Color, C Print, Digital

Bea with a whip at The Other Side

Bea with a whip at The Other Side

By Nan Goldin

Located in New York, NY

Nan Goldin Bea with a whip at The Other Side 1973 Gelatin silver print 14 x 11 inches; 36 x 28 cm Edition of 100 Signed, titled, dated, and numbered in graphite (lower right verso) ...

Category

1970s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Portrait Photography for Sale on 1stDibs

Portrait photography can be a powerful part of your wall decor. Find a provocative and compelling portrait that speaks to you and you might find that the photograph will speak to your guests too.

Prior to the development of photography, which eventually replaced portrait paintings as a quicker and more efficient way of capturing a person’s essence, the subject of a portrait had to sit for hours until the painter had finished. In 1839, chemist and Philadelphia-based photographer Robert Cornelius didn’t have to wait very long for his portrait. In a matter of minutes, he captured what many believe to be the first portrait photograph. This shot was also the first self-portrait (or what we now call a “selfie”), and fine photography quickly became an art form.

Landscape photography, nude photography and portrait photography are very popular in today's modern interiors. A portrait can reveal a lot about the person in it. It can also add a narrative touch to your decor. You’ll often find that photographs of loved ones work well as decorative touches. A portrait of a family member or dear friend can help turn a house into a home, warming any space by evoking fond memories.

While family portraits can stir emotion, portraits of celebrities and important historical figures can also add a rich dynamic to your space. Portraits of famous musicians or intriguing actors hung in your dining room or home bar shot by Gered Mankowitz or Annie Leibovitz might inspire deep conversation over meals or drinks. Douglas Kirkland is also famous for his celebrity portraits. His photojournalism made him much sought after by Hollywood studios to document the filming of movies. In Kirkland’s powerful depiction of Hollywood stars, he excellently captures the glamour of their lives.

Other artists like Elliott Erwitt stand out by turning portraiture into a playful art form. Before graduating from high school in Hollywood, Erwitt had already begun to teach himself to take pictures, inspired by the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson. In image after image, Erwitt captured what photographers call “the moment” with rapier wit and penetrating humanity.

Portrait photography can be incredibly expressive, setting the tone and mood for a room. And there are different ways of incorporating portrait photography into your interior decor. If you’re thinking about adding color photography to a bedroom or living room, the colors of the portraits can become part of the room’s palette, while portraits shot in black and white won’t disrupt an existing color scheme.

On 1stDibs, find a vast selection of portrait photography from different eras, including 1950s portraits, 1960s portrait photography and more.

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