In 1949 Shulman also visited Hanny's department store (now adapted into a restaurant in downtown Phoenix), an A. This association with Drake led Shulman to an introduction to Frank Lloyd Wright and the widely-published photographs we know today. Drake was once a Fellow at Taliesin West but set out on his own in the 40s, creating a successful practice in designing single-story desert modern homes and tasteful remodels (with a passion for modern, minimalist hearths - well documented by Shulman, surely for speculative use in magazines). The earliest known images the Getty Research Institute could help us find were taken in 1949, during a visit that appears to be designed to document the work of a young Blaine Drake. We always knew the photograph we'd inherited was special, we just didn't know it was that special. Through my research in the Archives I unearthed treasures of popular architecture by forgotten tract home designer John Sing Tang, the glory days of now-neglected Country Club Apartments by Ralph Haver, and a Blaine Drake remodel once owned by my husband's grandmother. Here highbrow and lowbrow collide tract houses on tumbleweed-lined lots rub shoulders with architectural masterworks like the Woods/Mills House (a.k.a. That's what is unique about Modern Phoenix's curation of his Arizona work. The publishing houses have their own editorial agendas, and ours has always been to crack the mystery wide open and set local design history free. Occasionally he'd sigh in delight, as if bumping into an unexpected old friend, upon seeing a photo of his that might not have seen the light of day for decades: "That's beautiful, it portrays the house!" Though they were well published in their time, such as a Haver Home in Arizona Homes magazine Wand a Blaine Drake home in Sunset, only the most recognizable work by Arizona's biggest names seems to get selected for publication in art photography volumes by the likes of Taschen and Phaidon: Frank Lloyd Wright, Paolo Soleri and Blaine Drake. Shulman, I love Arcosanti too, but I only had 4 hours at the Archives and a limited budget! And alas, now you cannot go with me.) We'll have to do some research ourselves." "I should be there with you! Let's go there on assignment. He insisted we go back to the Getty Institute, together. He chided us for bringing only one set of Arcosanti photos from the 70s with us, instead of the complete series he had taken over the years. Where those photographs are now, who knows, who gives a damn? In those days the magazines were not printing pictures of Italian prisoners of war."Ĭolorful memories, such as sitting on hay bales staged on the flat rooftops of Haver Homes, painted a picture of desert life in the 40s and 50s. All that mattered was to deliver a set of glossy prints. "I'd deliver a set of 8X10 prints to whomever gave me the assignment, the commanding officer. ![]() He was reluctant to regale David with details about Arizona architects and instead was excited to talk about his experiences photographing prisoners of war in Italian and German internment camps in Florence, Arizona and why they might be forgotten or lost already in his body of work. ![]() ![]() Shulman was characteristically sassy that day, patiently tolerating and then redirecting the questions we'd prepared. It was developing into too good of a story to give up.ĭisappointed but undaunted we sent the Editor of Desert Living magazine, David Tyda, to Los Angeles with our Arizona findings on a laptop to capture what would become Shulman's last known interview about (and only known large curation of) 70+ samples of exclusively Arizona work. This led to a jaw-dropping journey through the Julius Shulman Archive at the Getty Research Institute to find whatever we could about Arizona in his imagery. We'd spent hours with our noses in borrowed books ferreting out the handful of photos and writing about his Arizona work. He was happy to oblige, but at 98 he became too frail to travel for our event. In Autumn of 2008 we invited legendary architectural photographer Julius Shulman to be our guest speaker at the Modern Phoenix Expo 2009, specifically to talk about his work in the state of Arizona. A prolific author, consultant, lecturer, exhibitor, and editor of his own vast archive.Arizona at Midcentury Photographs by Julius Shulman Shulman’s images played a major role in crafting the image of the Los Angeles and “Southern California lifestyle” to the rest of the nation and world during the 1950s and 1960s. One of the leading architectural photographers of the 20th century, Julius Shulman developed close association with the modernist architects, principally those active in Southern California such as Gregory Ain, John Lautner, Richard Neutra, and R.M. Photographer of architecture, naturalist, educator, and commentator on urban form.
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