Milton Rogovin
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Milton Rogovin (born December 30, 1909, in New York City) is a documentary photographer and has been likened to the great social documentary photographers of the 19th and 20th centuries, Lewis Hine and Jacob Riis. His photographs are in the Library of Congress, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Center for Creative Photography and other distinguished institutions around the world.
After graduating from Columbia University, Milton moved to Buffalo in 1938, setting up his own optometry business. In 1942, he married a woman by the name of Anne Snetsky. In that same year, he was inducted into the army, working as an optometrist. After being discharged from the army, Milton and his wife Anne had three children: two daughters (Ellen and Paula), and one son (Mark). He was called before the House un-American Activities Committee in 1952. Along with many other Americans, Milton was subject and victim of the Communist witch-hunts. The incident inspired Milton to turn to photography as a means of expression. For Milton, photography was a means to, above all else, keep his voice from being silenced. In his life, Milton has traveled throughout the world, taking numerous photographs, and earning highly-accredited awards. Still, out of all his work, his most impressive feat was in the development of “The Forgotten One’s.” In the work, Milton captured over a hundred families from Buffalo’s lower west side. Milton’s started the project in 1972, completing it more than thirty years later (in 2003), at the age of 92. In 1999, the Library of Congress collected more than one thousand of Rogovin’s prints. Today, Rogovin is acknowledged not only as an exceptional artist, but as a hero of working class people.
[edit] External links
- Milton Rogovin Web Site
- Milton Rogovin Photograph Collection
- NPR Interview from 2003
- Milton Rogovin: Seeing the Forgotten Ones - Photography of the Working Class
