Garry Winogrand

Garry Winogrand (1928–1984) was an American street photographer whose spontaneous images redefined documentary photography in postwar America. Born in the Bronx, he studied painting at City College of New York before turning to photography in the early 1950s. Winogrand’s work captured the energy and contradictions of urban life—crowded sidewalks, bustling diners, and the fleeting gestures of strangers—often taken at oblique angles and with rapid-fire sequences.

Throughout his career, Winogrand exhibited at institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His groundbreaking monograph, The Animals (1969), revealed his playful yet incisive approach to subjects, while his later series, Women Are Beautiful (1975), challenged prevailing norms by celebrating women’s presence in public spaces. Known for shooting hundreds of rolls of film in a single day, he left behind an archive of more than 2,500 rolls at his death, much of it unpublished until years later.

Winogrand’s influence endures in contemporary street photography and documentary practice. His insistence on capturing “the decisive moment” in everyday scenes paved the way for generations of photographers. Posthumously, his work has been the subject of retrospectives at venues including the International Center of Photography and Tate Modern, and continues to inspire discussions about chance, perception, and the social fabric of city life.