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Gjon Mili
Mili on a 2008 Albanian stamp
Born	(1904-11-28)November 28, 1904 Korçë, Albania
Died	February 14, 1984(1984-02-14) (aged 79) Stamford, Connecticut, U.S.
Alma mater	Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Known for	Photography

Gjon Mili (November 28, 1904 – February 14, 1984) was an Albanian photographer from Korçë who developed his profession in America, best known for his work published in Life, in which he photographed artists such as Pablo Picasso.

Biography

Gjon Mili was born to Vasil Mili and Viktori Cekani in Korçë, in the Manastir Vilayet of the Ottoman Empire (present-day Albania). Mili spent his childhood in Romania, attending Gheorghe Lazăr National College in Bucharest, and migrating to the United States in 1923. In 1939, Mili started to work as a photographer for Life (a position he held until he died in 1984). Over the years his assignments took him to the Riviera (Picasso); to Prades, France (Pau Casals in exile); to Israel (Adolf Eichmann in captivity); to Florence, Athens, Dublin, Berlin, Venice, Rome, and to Hollywood to photograph celebrities and artists, sports events, concerts, sculptures and architecture.

Working with Harold Eugene Edgerton of MIT, Gjon Mili was a pioneer in the use of stroboscopic instruments to capture a sequence of actions in one photograph. Trained as an engineer and self-taught in photography, Gjon Mili was one of the first to use electronic flash and stroboscopic light to create photographs that had more than scientific interest. Many of his images revealed the intricacy and flow of movement too rapid or complex for the naked eye to discern. In the mid-1940s, he was an assistant to the photographer Edward Weston.

In 1944, he directed the short film Jammin' the Blues, which was made at Warner Bros., and features performances by Lester Young, Red Callender, Harry Edison, "Big" Sid Catlett, Illinois Jacquet, Barney Kessel, Jo Jones and Marie Bryant. Mili did not serve as cinematographer for the film (Robert Burks did) but the film used multiplied images that in many ways recall the multi-image still-frames done with the strobe. The imaginative use of the camera makes this film a minor landmark in the way that musicians have been filmed.

Over the course of more than four decades, thousands of his pictures were published by Life as well as other publications.

Mili died of pneumonia in Stamford, Connecticut, at the age of 79.

Collaboration with Pablo Picasso

Gjon Mili is perhaps best known for his pioneering work in light photography, particularly his collaboration with Pablo Picasso. In 1949, Mili visited Picasso in the South of France and introduced him to the concept of using a small electric light to "draw" in the air while the camera captured the image with a long exposure. This meeting led to the creation of a series of light drawings, including the famous image of Picasso drawing a centaur in the air.

According to Holden Luntz Gallery, this collaboration exemplifies Mili's innovative use of stroboscopic instruments, which allowed him to freeze and capture the intricate motion of light in a way that had never been seen before. The resulting photographs are considered masterpieces of 20th-century art and a testament to the creative possibilities of combining photography with other artistic mediums.

References

1. ^ Greer, William R. (February 16, 1984). "Gjon Mili Life Magazine Photographer Dies". The New York Times.
2. Jammin' the Blues at IMDb
3. Jammin' The Blues on YouTube
4. Luntz, Holden (September 19, 2014). "Gjon Mili's Pablo Picasso "Draws" a Centaur in the Air with Light". Holden Luntz Gallery. Retrieved August 22, 2024.

External links

• Gjon Mili photographs at Time magazine

• 1904 births
• 1984 deaths
• Albanian inventors
• People from Korçë
• People from Manastir vilayet
• Albanian people from the Ottoman Empire
• Albanian photographers
• Emigrants from the Ottoman Empire to Romania
• Romanian emigrants to the United States
• 20th-century American photographers
• Jazz photographers
• Deaths from pneumonia in Connecticut