Roman Vishniac
Overview
 
Roman Vishniac was a Russian-American photographer, best known for capturing on film the culture of Jews in Central
Central Europe
Central Europe or alternatively Middle Europe is a region of the European continent lying between the variously defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe...

 and Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...

 before the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...

. A complete archive of his work now rests at the International Center of Photography
International Center of Photography
The International Center of Photography is a photography museum, school, and research center in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States...

.

Vishniac was an extremely diverse photographer, an accomplished biologist
Biology
Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...

 and a knowledgeable collector and teacher of art history
History of art
The History of art refers to visual art which may be defined as any activity or product made by humans in a visual form for aesthetical or communicative purposes, expressing ideas, emotions or, in general, a worldview...

. Throughout his life, he made significant scientific contributions to photomicroscopy
Micrograph
A micrograph or photomicrograph is a photograph or digital image taken through a microscope or similar device to show a magnified image of an item.Micrographs are widely used in all fields of microscopy.-Photomicrograph:...

 and time-lapse photography
Time-lapse
Time-lapse photography is a cinematography technique whereby the frequency at which film frames are captured is much lower than that which will be used to play the sequence back. When replayed at normal speed, time appears to be moving faster and thus lapsing...

.
Quotations

Even before the concentration camps, I felt it was my duty to my ancestors to preserve a world which might cease to exist.

Testament to a Lost People

Concentration camp money... It was a German sadism that invented it. Can you do anything with it? Yes, you can cry.

Testament to a Lost People

The Jews of the shtetls that Tolstoy remembered were saints... the people I photographed were saints. So now, in 1983, I tell the world: When you learn about Goethe, don't forget to study the Holocaust, too.

Testament to a Lost People

...can you call a farm with a dozen geese a farm? Still, it was a little better for the Jews in Czechoslovakia. There were only two pogroms there. What's two pogroms?

Testament to a Lost People

Nature, God, or whatever you want to call the creator of the universe comes through the microscope clearly and strongly

ICP Library of Photographers. Roman Vishniac. Grossman Publishers, New York. 1974. pg 42.

The purpose of photography is the transmission of a visualized sector of life through the medium of the camera into a mental process that starts with the photographer's thinking about the subject he photographs and is continued in the mind of the spectator.

Deschin, Jacob. "Nature as it is". New York Times (1857-Current file); Feb 3, 1952; Proquest Historical Newspapers The New York Times (1851 - 2002) pg. X14

You can't teach biology with a bottle containing dead animals and organisms.

Shepard, Richard F. "Roman Vishniac, 92, a Biologist And Photographer of Jews, Dies". New York Times (1859-Current file); Jan 23, 1990; ProQuest Historical Newspapers The New York Times (1951 - 2002) pg. D23.

[his scientific accomplishments] were overshadowed by the photographs he took of Jews in prewar Eastern Europe and in Nazi Berlin. -- Shepard, Richard

"Roman Vishniac, 92, a Biologist And Photographer of Jews, Dies"

 
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