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Errol Sawyer
Errol Sawyer, Amsterdam, 2001
Nationality	American
Education	NYU
Known for	Photography

Errol Francis Sawyer (born Errol Stanley Sawyer on August 8, 1943) is an American photographer who currently lives and works in Amsterdam, Holland.

Early life

Errol Sawyer was born in Miami, Florida. His parents were Robert Earl Sawyer (1923–94), an African-American playwright, whose family emigrated from Nassau, Bahamas, to Miami, and Mamie Lucille Donaldson (1928-2009), an African-American Cherokee Indian, whose family lived in Bainbridge, Georgia. She was for 25 years head of the Intensive Care Unit of the Bronx-Lebanon Hospital Center in the Bronx, New York City.

In 1950, he moved with his mother and sister from Miami, Florida, to Harlem, New York City, and three years later to The Bronx. In 1961 he graduated from James Monroe High School. From 1962 until 1966 he studied history and political science at New York University. Greenwich Village exposed him to the world of art and culture, and to chess which has to be a lasting passion. Like so many of his contemporaries, he absorbed the spirit of the Sixties and refers to the profound impact the concert at Woodstock had on him. At Mickey Ruskin’s club Max’s Kansas City, where he was a regular visitor, he met Diane Arbus who made a portrait of Errol in her studio.

Professional life

In 2012 Julian Spalding, writer and former museum director, wrote about Sawyer’s work:

Errol Sawyer is that rare thing today – a classical black and white photographer in the Henri Cartier-Bresson tradition, using the camera at its simplest and most challenging, as a trap for catching time. Looking at his pictures, I feel more fully in tune with living today, and my guess is that people in the future will continue to look at them, and by doing so, get a glimpse of what it was really like to be alive today.

In 1968, Sawyer found his vocation as a photographer while traveling in Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. He bought his first camera, a Kowa, in 1966 and became a professional photographer in 1971 when he got his first commissions in London. In the beginning of his career he cites photographers James Moore, Bill Silano, Richard Avedon and Gosta Peterson as influences.

In the early 1970s Sawyer was living and working in Paris and London. His photographs were published in magazines such as Dépêche Mode, Elle and French Vogue. He photographed the African-American painter Beauford Delaney and the American actresses Patti D'Arbanville, Jessica Lange and Maria Schneider in Paris. In 1973 he discovered the American model Christie Brinkley, took her first modeling photos and convinced John Casablancas to accept her at Elite Model Management, Paris.

In 1978, Sawyer returned to New York and worked for magazines such as New York Magazine, Working Women and American Vogue. He did beauty campaigns for Avon, Germaine Monteil and Max Factor. In the meantime he continued to work on street reportage.

Since 1984 Sawyer has devoted his energy toward the realisation of special project assignments in the commercial arena and did multicultural beauty projects for L'Oréal and Vis-A-Vis Magazine, However, most of his time is spent on documentary and fine art photography: naturally lit black and white photographs in the streets of New York, Paris and Amsterdam where he has lived since 1999.

According to Sawyer a picture is good when it leaves room for you to imagine. He provokes the viewer to more closely look at situations that are likely to be overlooked in the every day continuous motion of the city. He photographs people, graffiti, and perspectives in public and semi-public space, at parks, streets and underground stations. His fine art pictures have been published in The Sun (magazine), Zone Zero Magazine of Pedro Meyer, PF Magazine, Filosofie Magazine and Het Parool in Holland and VLAK Magazine.In 2001 Herman Hoeneveld wrote in the Dutch PF Magazine:

Errol Sawyer could be justifiably called a cultural philosopher. — He is a writing photographer, who seems to press for consciousness and contemplation. He calls on our common sense to not allow our feelings to be crushed by the unbridled rush for consumption.

From 2006 until 2010, Sawyer has been a guest professor of photography at Technical University Delft in Holland.

In 2010 his photo book City Mosaïc is published. It contains a compilation of 64 black & white images of mainly of New York, Paris and Amsterdam. The pictures are divided in three chapters: ‘Graffiti,’ ‘Portraits & City Scenes’ and ‘Perspectives.’

A. D. Coleman, American photography critic and author, wrote in his essay 'Words of the Prophet' in this book:

It comprises close to four decades’ worth of engagement with the classic mode of mainstream-modernist street photography. — Consistent in quality, in terms of both craft and content, it speaks in its own voice, aware of the tradition on which it builds but not noticeably beholden to any predecessor therein.

Exhibitions

Sawyer has held solo exhibitions at:

• 4th Street Gallery, New York, USA, 1989. Theme Children of East End.
• Royal Photographic Society, Bath, England, 1992. Theme Children of East End.
• La Musée de la Photographie, Bièvre, France, 1993. Theme Paris.
• Foto Huset Gallery, Götenburg, Sweden, 1993. Theme Graffiti.
• No Name Gallery, Basel, Switzerland, 1993. Theme Graffiti.
• La Chambre Claire Gallery, Paris, France, 2000. Theme City Mosaïc.
• The Royal Gallery, Amsterdam, Holland, 2010. Theme Diofior, A Village in Senegal.

Collections

• La Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, France, 1974 and 2001. 37 pictures.
• Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Harlem, New York, 1997. 40 pictures.
• Eric Franck Gallery, London, England, 1997. 21 pictures.
• Fadi Zahar, La Chambre Claire Gallery, Paris, France, 2000. 4 pictures.
• Manfred Heiting, Amsterdam, Holland, 2002. 2 pictures.
• Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, 2004. 2 pictures in the 'Manfred Heiting Collection.'
• Tate Gallery Britain, London, England, 2012. 6 pictures in the 'London Collection' of Eric and Louise Franck.

References

1. ^ Sawyer, Errol. City Mosaic. Errol Sawyer Foundation, Amsterdam, 2010, ISBN 978-90-816041-1-6
2. http://www.robertearlsawyer.org
3. ^ Hoeneveld, Herman. “Errol Sawyer”, Duotoon, PF Magazine, Holland, nr 2, 2001, pp 51-58.
4. http://www.julianspalding.net/JS/Errol_Sawyer.html
5. http://lesamisdebeauforddelaney.blogspot.nl/2012/09/errol-sawyers-photographic-portrait-of.html
6. http://entreetoblackparis.blogspot.nl/2012/09/errol-sawyer-photographer.html
7. Gross, Michael. Model: The Ugly Business of Beautiful Women. William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York, 1995, pp 317-18. ISBN 0-688-12659-6
8. http://www.visavismag.com
9. "Contributors". The Sun (327). Harlan, IA. March 2003. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
10. "Contributors". The Sun (342). Harlan, IA. June 2004. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
11. http://www.zonezero.com/comunity/portfolios/documental/sawyer/1en.html
12. http://www.facebook.com/vlakmagazine
13. http://www.ideabooks.nl/index.php?what=c&u=errol+sawyer
14. http://www.nearbycafe.com/artandphoto/photocritic/about-a-d-coleman/adc-in-print-and-pixels/recent-publications/
15. http://www.nearbycafe.com
16. La Chambre Claire Gallery, Paris, France, City Mosaic exhibition
17. "Catalogue Bn-Opale Plus — Notice d'autorité personne". La Bibliothèque Nationale. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
18. http://www.artnet.com/artists/errol-sawyer/untitled-children-playing-on-blackheath-2-works-deOfvUfJFCF2-P_TrDzWyg2
19. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, USA. List of Photography Collection, 4 August 2004

External links

• errolsawyer.com - Documentary and Fine Art (requires Flash)
• errolsawyerstudio.com - Beauty and Portrait (requires Flash)

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