Irving Penn Small Traders

Irving Penn Biography (1917 - 2009) – Small Trades.
American photographer noted for his sophisticated fashion images and incisive portraits.
Last Monday I discovered Irving Penn’s little-known portraits of anonymous street traders, taken in Paris, London and New York between 1950 and 1951. I remembered an advert I had seen in a magazine for Penn’s work, but could not remember where it was. But, thanks to the staff at the Barbican I found that the Hamiton’s Gallery was displaying Penn’s ”Small Traders”. I had not come across this part of his work, but how fascinating.
These images have not been seen in the UK, but the Hamiltons Gallery, speaking to Charlie, they have been involved with the Penn studio (now the Foundation since his death) for 25 years.
They were taken over the period from 1950 to 1951, in New York, London and Paris. These images are depictions of skilled street traders (jobs not available in most cases now), and include a Parisian cheese-seller, a locomotive Fireman in London and a Deep sea diver in New York. They are very different to the Penn exhibition currently at the National Portrait Gallery, which are also in Black and White.
He has posed the tradesmen with their tools and implements of their trades, against a neutral background. He also used a similar technique when he was travelling to Peru etc. Did he take the same background with him? This is a different way to take portraits, which until I saw this I was unaware that this is the sort of thing I am attempting in the studio this time round. The pose is very simple, as is the lighting. This seems to come from one direction, but uses his favourite North light. There is however a clue in the image of his studio in Paris in 1950. The poses are very simple, and each subject is treated in exactly the same way, and portrays the subject in a good way, and my favourite that I saw in the collection was the Milkman. He has a wonderful, almost bemused, expression on his face, and it goes with his pose. Each subject was asked to turn up dressed with their work clothes, except the subjects in New York who apparently turned up in their Sunday best, and were sent home to change.
Apparently, he fitted these portraits sessions around fashion shoots and celebrity portraits, with the studio often littered with couture dresses. The results are very interesting, and you do have to look at them, and the prints are superbly presented at the Gallery, but then for between £75 and £250 K they should be.