LIVING OLD MASTERS BY J C STRAUSS

J. C. STRAUSS - LIVING OLD MASTERS PAGE 4

by Thomas Yanul, copyright

In a June 1911 issue of Camera Craft Magazine, a brief account was given of "LIVING OLD MASTERS by STRAUSS." The unique image portrayals were actually a blend of photographic portraits, great amounts of retouching and in-fill, multiple copy negatives, and a final printing possibly as hand-finished photogravures,but that is not certain. Originals have not been found yet.

The resultant images were both fancifull and/or artistic versions of living people - many well known photographers - as modern representatives of classic images in the style of famous painters such as Rembrant, Holbein, Raphael and others. The more one learns about Strauss the more one feels that they are an artistic statement by a noted portrait photographer while at the same time being a gregarious outpouring of sheer cartoonism, but with the added dimensions of serious scholarship and lots of difficult photographic manipulation.

There seems to be no doubt that Strauss reveled in the responce to these unusual images not only from the publication audience, but also what must have been a very personal feedback from those friends that were featured as historical icons from the past. It must have been sheer delight on his part as another cohort became a classically robed figure whose unmistakable features now found them in a few centuries early tableau.

The 1911 article mentioned that Strauss had been making these "Masters" for many years, and fortunately for us, a 1904 Issue of Photo-Era Magazine published several of these images. The 1911 article states that the Sunday edition of the New York Herald carried a page of these images...unfortunately that page seems not to even have been microfilmed, and extant copies of that July 23rd edition seem not to have survived. One other print, an original, seems to be in the Strauss archives of the Missouri Historical Society that I saw in 2002.

So for now I will post the images that were included in the 1904 Photo-Era magazine with hopes that some originals will turn up to allow for a much better illustration since the magazines images are not especially high quality depictions.

HENRY HAVELOCK PIERCE - NEWPORT

"AFTER A PORTRAIT BY FRANZ HALLS - VIENNA GALLERY"
HENRY HAVELOCK PIERCE, OF NEWPORT, BOSTON, NEW YORK ACCORDING TO ART CRITIC SADAKICHI HARTMAN, PIERCE WAS SOMETHING OF AN ITINERANT PHOTOGRAPHER WHO OFTEN CHANGED LOCATIONS PHOTOGRAPHING WHEREVER AND WHENEVER IT PLEASED HIM. (Pierce 1864-1943 )

To see original portrait "WILLEM van HEYTHUYZEN" GO HERE