Seeing in Color

October 13, 2013 ·

Eric Meola

Prismatic Light on Staircase © Eric Meola

One bleak November morning in 1968, I woke up very early and took the R train in Manhattan up to 57th Street and Seventh Avenue.  I walked a couple of blocks south and crossed over to the east side of the street and tried to ignore the lingerie mannequins in the window as I walked up to the building at 853 Seventh Avenue and started to ring the buzzer forErnst Haas.  Just before doing so, I checked my watch. It was 5:55 A.M. I hesitated, deciding to wait five minutes before finally reaching out and nervously placing my finger on the button.  The night before, after talking briefly with Haas, I had made an appointment to see him “at six,” and as I hung up the phone, I realized I had no idea whether he meant A.M. or P.M.  On a hunch, I went with my gut, but…what if I was wrong?  No sooner did I hear the buzzer go off with a disconcertingly loud and annoying sound, than I heard a European voice through the the intercom telling me to come up.

Forty-three years later, I walked into a gift shop one day and after wading through the isles of stationery, chocolate and dolls, I came upon a woman sitting at an easel while painting.  Behind her were some of her paintings—bucolic and sedate oils of scenery along with some portraits.  Through a partition, I could see something far more interesting to me and, as I stood in the doorway, I asked her about the wall of abstract colors.  “Oh…that?” she said, in a voice both filled with amusement and dripping with disdain.  Then she added “That’swhere I clean my brushes and test my colors.  And to emphasize how little she thought of it, she added “We’ll be painting over that wall next week!”

Untitled Abstract © 2011 Eric Meola

I asked her if I could photograph the wall, and no sooner had she said “yes, sure, go ahead. Knock yourself out” than I began cropping sections of it in my mind and in the camera.  One hundred frames later I thanked her, and as I walked out my mind raced back to that day in 1968 and to what Haas had asked me.

As I sat down in his apartment, he asked if I would like some tea.  I sat there with my portfolio on my knees, wondering what to say and what not to say; then he looked straight at me and asked “Do you paint?”   I was thrown off guard, and disappointed.  I was a photographer and I did not want to talk about painting.  I wanted advice.  I wanted to hear one of my heroes talk about making images.  The last thing I wanted to talk about was painting.

There was a long, awkward silence, and then I said “No.”  Haas didn’t hesitate one bit as he continued to probe.  “Why not?” he asked.  I told him I didn’t know how to paint.  And then, with a twinkle in his eye, and a smile that somehow cut me in half while consoling me, he firmly said “You don’t need to know how to paint to paint.”  Half an hour later I walked out into the day’s gloom wondering just what he meant and what he was trying to tell me.

1968 was a good time—just how good, I had little idea.  Across the Hudson, a young man named Clarence Clemons was working as a counselor for emotionally disturbed children in Newark.  It would be three years before he would meet Bruce Springsteen and another four years before they would walk into my studio in lower Manhattan.  Stan Kanney and Larry Fried had yet to start a company called The Image Bank, and there was no “photo district.”  Nor was there the “Black Book” of self promotion.  Sean Callahan, an editor atLife, would not begin to publishAmerican Photographermagazine for another decade.  Hiro,Avedon,Art Kane,Jay Maisel, andPete Turnerwere all making great images, and the magazines were filled with a kaleidoscope of dazzling photographs.  It was a time when you could stand outside the Time-Life building and seeAlfred Eisenstaedt—”Eisie”—stride in after walking several miles from his apartment.  Marty Forscher, the genius of camera repair and modification, had yet to see his first auto-focus camera come into his shop at 37 West 47th Street.  And Nikon had yet to declare that “We take the world’s greatest pictures.”  

Untitled Abstract #2 © 2011 Eric Meola

What Haas was telling me in those seemingly prehistoric times was to open my eyes, to learn how to see, to slow down, to open my mind, to see the world in a grain of sand, to dream, to walk the streets, to watch the light, and to feel the wind on my face.  The trinity formed by Haas, Pete Turner and Jay Maisel, gave birth to a gallery called “The Space,” in Carnegie Hall.  I had my first exhibit there in 1979.  I was still learning to walk; I was still learning to see.  These were  the mentors for my generation, who showed us the road map for where photography could and would go. They took a staid and tired craft and made it their own.  They inspired us, they taught us, and they made us dream.  

August, 2011


Eric MEOLA

Showcasing a portfolio of his color images in its October 2008 issue, Rangefinder magazine referred to Eric as one of a “handful of color photographers who are true innovators.”

Eric Meola’s graphic use of color has informed his photographs and his distinguished career for more than four decades. His prints are in several private collections and museums, including the A.S.M.P. archive, the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., the International Center of Photography in New York, and the Museum of Modern Art in Munich.  He has won numerous awards including the “Advertising Photographer of the Year” award from the American Society of Media Photographers. 

In 1972 he photographed Haiti for Time magazine, resulting in one of his most famous images, “Coca Kid,” which was included in Life magazine’s special 1997 issue “100 Magnificent Images.”  In 1980 he had his first major exhibit in New York at the “Space” gallery in Carnegie Hall and his signature red, white and blue image “Promised Land,” was chosen for inclusion in the permanent collection of the George Eastman House.  In 1989 he was the only photographer named to Adweek magazine’s national “Creative All-Star Team”; and that same year he received a “Clio” for a series of images he made in Scotland for a breakthrough campaign featuring the outerwear clothing of the  Timberland company.  “Fire Eater,” his iconic image of the spotlit lips of a woman submerged in a tank of water, and commissioned by Almay cosmetics, was included in Robert Sobieszek’s  1993 book on advertising The Art of Persuasion. 

As an undergraduate at Syracuse University, he studied color printing and color theory at the Newhouse School of Journalism before graduating in 1968 with a B.A. in English Literature and then moving to NYC in 1969 to work with Pete Turner as his studio manager.   A Canon “Explorer of Light,” he has lectured extensively, including at Syracuse University, Rochester Institute of Technology, Brooks (Santa Barbara), the Art Center at Pasadena, Parsons, the Academy of Art College (San Francisco), the George Eastman House, and venues including PPA., WPPI, and A.S.M.P.

In 2004, GRAPHIS published his first book The Last Places on Earth, a look at disappearing tribes and cultures throughout the world.  An exhibition in England of his photographs of Bruce Springsteen, which coincided with the publication of his second book Born to Run: The Unseen Photos (Insight Editions, 2006), was followed in 2008 by INDIA: In Word & Image (Welcome Books, NY), and an exhibit in 2009 at the Art Directors Club of New York.

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Eric Meola’s graphic use of color has informed his photographs and his distinguished career for more than four decades. As an undergraduate at Syracuse University, he studied color printing and color theory with legendary instructor Tom Richards at the Newhouse School of Journalism before graduating in 1968 with a B.A. in English Literature and then moving to New York City in 1969 to work with Pete Turner as his studio manager. Eric’s prints are in several private collections and museums, and he has won numerous awards including the “Advertising Photographer of the Year” award in 1986 from the American Society of Media Photog-raphers. Showcasing a portfolio of his color images in its October 2008 issue, Rangefinder magazine re-ferred to Eric as one of a “handful of color photographers who are true innovators.”In 1972 he photographed Haiti for Time magazine, resulting in one of his most famous images, “Coca Kid,” which was included in Life magazine’s special 1997 issue “100 Magnificent Images,” as well as the ASMP archive at the International Center of Photography. His Time cover portrait of opera singer Bever-ly Sills would later be included in the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery. In 1980 his signature red, white and blue image “Promised Land,” was chosen for inclusion in the permanent collec-tion of the George Eastman House. In 1989 he was the only photographer named to Adweek magazine’s national “Creative All-Star Team”; and that same year he received a “Clio” for a series of images he made in Scotland for a Timberland ad campaign. “Fire Eater,” his iconic image of the spotlit lips of a woman submerged in a tank of water, and commissioned by Almay cosmetics, was included in Robert Sobieszek’s 1993 book on advertising The Art of Persuasion. He made a spectacular series of panoramic images for the Johnnie Walker Company in 1995, which were included in an exhibit of his work in New York. He has lectured extensively, including at Syracuse University, the Rochester Institute of Technolo-gy, the Art Center at Pasadena, Parsons, and the Academy of Art College in San Francisco. In 2004, Graphis Editions published his first book The Last Places on Earth, a look at disappearing tribes and cultures throughout the world. An exhibition in England of his photographs of Bruce Springsteen, which coincided with the publication of his second book Born to Run: The Unseen Photos (Insight Edi-tions, 2006), was followed in 2008 by INDIA: In Word & Image (Welcome Books, NY), and an exhibit in 2009 at the Art Directors Club of New York. In 2011, Ormond Yard Press of London published his most unusual book, an oversize (18”x24”, 14 lbs.) edition of photographs of Bruce Springsteen—Born to Run Revisted—that was limited to 500 copies. Streets of Fire, his fifth book, was published by HarperCollins in September of 2012. In October 2013, Welcome books published a new, expanded version of his INDIA book, and in the spring of 2014 he received the “Power of the Image” George Eastman award.

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