Kathryn Abbe | |
|---|---|
 Abbe at her house in 2005 | |
| Born | Kathryn McLaughlin (1919-09-22)September 22, 1919 Brooklyn, New York City, U.S. |
| Died | January 18, 2014(2014-01-18) (aged 94) |
| Education | Photography degree, 1941 |
| Alma mater | Pratt Institute,New School for Social Research |
| Occupation | Photographer |
| Employer(s) | Vogue, freelance photography |
| Known for | Photographs inVogue,Better Homes and Gardens,McCall's,Parents, andGood Housekeeping; a book,Twins on Twins, written with her twin sister |
| Spouse | James Abbe Jr. (m. 1946) |
| Children | 3 |
| Relatives | Frances McLaughlin-Gill (twin sister) Tomie dePaola (cousin) |
| Awards | Prix de Paris, 1941 |
Kathryn Abbe (September 22, 1919 – January 18, 2014) was an American photographer.[1]
Kathryn Abbe was born Kathryn McLaughlin in 1919, inBrooklyn. Her twin sister was photographerFrances McLaughlin-Gill. They were raised inWallingford, Connecticut, and were thevaledictorian andsalutatorian of their graduating class atLyman Hall High School. Abbe attended thePratt Institute, where she studied under Walter Civardi and painterReginald Marsh; she graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1941. She also attended theNew School for Social Research from 1939 until 1941, where she studied underYasuo Kuniyoshi. In 1946, she married photographer James Abbe Jr., the son of the Hollywood photographerJames Abbe. The couple had three children. She and her sister were the cousins of artistTomie dePaola.[2]
Abbe wonVogue magazine's Prix de Paris photography award in 1941. By 1942, she was working forVogue underToni Frissell; she left the magazine and became a professional freelance photographer in 1944 – one of few women to hold the position at the time.[2] Although in the 1940s she photographedNew England andBrooklyn extensively,[3] by the mid-1940s her assignments took her around the world, notably to Paris, Havana, New York, Rome and Milan. Her subjects often included fashion icons, entertainment personalities, children, street vignettes, and artists.[4] Her photographs ofCarmen Dell'Orefice andLisa Fonssagrives are particularly striking.[5] Her work was published in over eighty books and international periodicals, among them,Better Homes and Gardens,McCall's,Cosmopolitan,Good Housekeeping,Paris Match, andVogue. She was awarded more than twenty major magazine covers – a rare achievement for a female photographer of her time.
A co-author of three books,Stars of the Twenties Observed by James Abbe (1974),Twins on Twins, (with her twin sister, 1980), andTwin Lives in Photography (2011), Abbe lectured extensively and appeared on many television programs, among them, theDick Cavett Show.[2] A 2000 documentary,Twin Lenses, was produced about the lives and careers of Kathryn Abbe and Frances McLaughlin–Gill.[4][6]
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)| International | |
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