Joel Meyerowitz explains how he became “the magician of color” photography

Joel Meyerowitz: A Question of Color is the new eponymously titled book from the legendary street photographer, co-written (if not co-titled) with Robert Shore. It chronicles Meyerowitz’s early exploration of color film.

Joel Meyerowitz had been shooting street photography before the term was coined, establishing himself as an icon of the genre. He has been documenting life in the US for over 58 years, influencing many of the styles seen by modern artists and photographers.

His work has been exhibited in over 350 museums and galleries all around the world, and in 2017 was awarded a place in the Leica Hall of Fame while being nicknamed “The magician of color”. But how did Meyerowitz get this moniker at a time when color photography was preserved for holiday snappers?

The book showcases Meyerowitz’s first foray into color film photography, a journey of exploration through experimental images. The book delves into the industry-changing introduction of colored film, and how that impacted not only Meyerowitz’s work but the social and photographic landscape in the US.

At a time when the only ‘serious’ photography was in black-and-white, Meyerowitz started to experiment with both. When going out to take photographs he would take two cameras, one with black and white monochrome film, and one with the recently introduced color.

He would capture a scene with both film stocks, often not knowing which one was which. Once developed, Meyerowitz was left with two copies to choose from. He could not understand the resistance to taking color photography seriously, asking “But why? When the world is in color?”

This attitude led to Meyerowitz being recognized, along with Saul Leiter and William Eggleston, as one of the great color photographers.

Along with the beautiful photographs, there is also a conversation between Joel Meyerowitz and Robert Shore, an author of several books on contemporary art and photography. This conversation provides us with a detailed insight with a written personal account of Meyerowitz’s practice and life at the time, as told to Shore.