LIFE Magazine Show Opens At Monroe Gallery Of Photography

Like thousands of New Yorkers, Sid and Michelle Monroe left the city after the events of September 11 to find a new home. They chose the art and cultural capital of Santa Fe, New Mexico, where they opened the Monroe Gallery of Photography in April 2002. Now, twenty years later, they’re celebrating their gallery’s anniversary by revisiting the topic of their first show: the photographers of LIFE Magazine.

Opening on May 6, 2022, the exhibit celebrates what the Monroes call LIFE’s “stunning affirmation of the humanist notion that the camera’s proper function is to persuade and inform.” Photographs from essays by LIFE icons such as Margaret Bourke-White, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Carl Mydans, and Andreas Feininger will be on display. LIFE photographer Bob Gomel, now 88, will also be in attendance at the opening reception from 5-7pm on Friday, May 6.

LIFE.com recently caught up with the gallerists Sid and Michelle Monroe over email to learn more about their show and their thoughts on LIFE, and, well, life in Santa Fe.

How did you become gallerists? Why did you choose to focus on photojournalism?

We both entered the museum field after college, Michelle with the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum and Sid with the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Michelle was also a working artist and Sid was the director of a SoHo gallery specializing in fine art editions, where the gallery owner was exploring an exhibition with Alfred Eisenstaedt in collaboration with the LIFE Picture Collection. In 1985, we sat down with Alfred Eisenstaedt to discuss the exhibition and, then in our 20s, were were awed and engaged with his stories of an extraordinary life behind the camera.

We understood that we were in the presence of something bigger than we had ever encountered before. The work of Alfred Eisenstaedt is our collective history—we didn’t live this but this is what formed the world we were born into. In the eighties, photography was only beginning to gain a foothold in the fine art market, and most galleries were concentrating on the early “masters” of fine art photography. Eisenstaedt, and in general the field of photojournalism, had not been exhibited in a gallery setting. We believed immediately that a gallery which combined the realms of art, history, and reportage would be unique, and that set us on our course.

Albert Einstein 1948

Albert Einstein

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Why a LIFE exhibition? Why now?

We had our beginning in New York, and over the course of the 1990s had the extraordinary opportunity to meet, get to know, and work with many of the legendary photographers of LIFE magazine, all in their retirement years. Through countless conversations, we learned how they saw the world and recorded it for the magazine, and more importantly, for history. Their work, and work approach, helped us gain insight into how to view their photographs, decades after they made them. Ever since, we have have worked conscientiously over the past 20 years to establish Monroe Gallery of Photography at the intersection between photojournalism and fine art, showcasing works embedded in our collective consciousness that shape our shared history. The Gallery represents several of the most significant photojournalists up to the present day, but the work of the LIFE photographers has been our foundation.

Mother and child in Hiroshima, Japan, December 1945.

Mother and child in Hiroshima, Japan, December 1945.

Alfred Eisenstaedt; The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

What do you wish collectors knew about LIFE? The general public?

The work of the photographers of LIFE magazine came to define the medium of photojournalism, and their photographs recorded history and informed us all for most of the twentieth century. It was long one of the most popular and widely imitated of American magazines, selling millions of copies a week. From its start, LIFE emphasized photography, with gripping, superbly chosen news photographs, amplified by photo features and photo essays on an international range of topics. Its photographers were the elite of their craft and enjoyed worldwide esteem. Published weekly from 1936 to 1972, the work of the photographers of LIFE magazine came to define the medium of photojournalism.

American sprinters Tommie Smith (center) and John Carlos (right), after winning gold and bronze Olympic medals in the 200m, respectively, raise their fists in a Black Power salute, Mexico, 1968. Australian silver medalist Peter Norman is at left.

American sprinters Tommie Smith (center) and John Carlos (right), after winning gold and bronze Olympic medals in the 200 meters, respectively, raised their fists in a Black Power salute, Mexico, 1968. Australian silver medalist Peter Norman is at left.

John Dominis/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Do you have a favorite piece in the show?

Considering we curated the exhibit from potentially thousands of images, the exhibit itself represents our favorites—with enough left over we could easily do a “part two”!

Who are some of your favorite LIFE photographers? Are there some that may have been overlooked?

That’s a difficult question, as each LIFE photographer had their own individual and particular personality and style. We consider ourselves extraordinarily privileged to have been able to have known, and call friends, so many of these great photographers. To name only a few, Eisenstaedt was by many measures the “Dean” of the LIFE photographers and he taught us how to “see”;  Carl Mydans left a deep impression on us with his humility and intense humanistic dedication; Bill Eppridge was deeply committed to documenting historic and deeply sensitive subjects; and Bob Gomel‘s versatility and ingenuity impresses us to this day. 

John Lennon;Paul Mccartney;Ringo Starr;George Harrison

John Lennon, George Harrison, Paul Mccartney and Ringo Starr, February 1964.

© Bob Gomel / Courtesy of Bob Gomel

And for people who plan to visit the LIFE show in Santa Fe, are there other favorite art spots in the area that you recommend?

Santa Fe is a gem of an art-destination city. There are over 200 galleries showing every possible form of art from ancient Native American art and pottery to cutting edge contemporary art. [We recommend] SITE Santa Fe, a contemporary art space; Institute of American Indian Arts; Museum Hill; Georgia O’Keeffe Museum; and Meow Wolf, an ‘immersive art installation’ where visitors enter and discover that nothing is as it seems…

Do you have advice for young photojournalists who might want to display their works in a gallery?

Foremost, understand and dedicate yourself to the profession and its specific ethical requirements. Respect its role as the fourth estate and its check on power. Do the work. The role of photojournalists has perhaps never been as vital and important as it is today.

Indian leader Mohandas Gandhi reading next to a spinning wheel at home. (Photo by Margaret Bourke-White/The LIFE Picture Collection © DotDash Meredith)

Indian leader Mohandas Gandhi reading next to a spinning wheel at home. (Photo by Margaret Bourke-White/The LIFE Picture Collection © DotDash Meredith)

The LIFE Photographers exhibit will be on display at Monroe Gallery from May 6 through June 26, 2022. For hours and location, please consult the gallery’s website.

Jill Golden is the director of the LIFE Picture Collection, an archive of more than 10 million photographs created by—and collected by—LIFE Magazine.

Mamma Mia! The Everlasting Appeal of ABBA

The following is from the introduction to LIFE’s brand new special tribute issue ABBA: Their Songs. Their Stories. Their Lives, available at newsstands and online.

At their 1996 reunion concert, punk pioneers the Sex Pistols wanted to poke fun at pointless pop. Before they took the stage at London’s Finsbury Park, ABBA’s “Dancing Queen” blasted out of the PA system.

By 1996, the ABBA phenomenon seemed long dead; once a guilty pleasure the world over, did the Swedish quartet’s catalog retain any cultural capital, or was it a frivolous relic of the disco age? Evidently, Sex Pistols front man Johnny Rotten thought “Dancing Queen”—coincidentally celebrating a 20th birthday alongside “Anarchy in the U.K.”—deserved to be mocked. But the aging punks and young hipsters in the crowd didn’t make fun of the song. They didn’t laugh or boo when they heard ABBA sing “You can dance, you can jive/Having the time of your life.” Instead, the audience sang along with delight.

Punk couldn’t kill “Dancing Queen.” Time couldn’t kill ABBA. A generation past their prime, Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad remained beloved. Now, a quarter century after that night when the Sex Pistols tried to make ABBA a punch line, the band has attained immortality.

Late South African president Nelson Mandela and Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain named ABBA as favorites. And they’re not the only revered statesmen and grunge champs who have adored the pop stars. When Foo Fighters leader (and ex-Nirvana drummer) Dave Grohl first heard ABBA’s 2021 reunion single “I Still Have Faith in You,” he “wept like a baby” and offered to play drums with the band anytime. When Secretary of State Colin Powell passed away, a military band performed “Dancing Queen” at his funeral. Powell loved ABBA so dearly he once got down on one knee and serenaded the foreign minister of Sweden with “Mamma Mia.”

Frequently dismissed as disposable in the early 1970s, ABBA has become essential. The band outlasted antagonists (such as the Sex Pistols) and would-be peers (at one point, KC and the Sunshine Band was poised to be bigger than ABBA). The foursome built their enduring popularity on solid pillars, including shrewd marketing; practically inventing the music video; and Agnetha and Frida’s charm, style, beauty, and golden voices. But it was mostly the music.

ABBA aimed high. They wanted to perfect pop. The group took the innovations of the ’60s (the Ronettes’ harmonies, the Beach Boys’ elaborate arrangements, the Beatles’ studio experiments) and synthesized them with forward-looking trends (glam rock, funk, disco, rock opera). Thanks to the members’ unique histories and personalities, ABBA ended up perfecting pop by reinventing it. 

No other band had ABBA’s strange formula. The two men wrote 95 percent of the songs but realized that their melodies improved exponentially when the two women intertwined their voices over them. The group mirrored the Scandinavian seasons by blending dark, brooding, minor-key verses (straight out of what Benny called the “melancholy belt”) with bright, blooming choruses. 

“The thing is, you keep the good stuff,” Benny told LIFE. “And very often the good stuff seems to be a little of everything with a string of melancholy… You hear yourself play things over and over again. Most of the stuff goes into the garbage bin. Some of it stays, and it tends to include more than just fun and joy.”

“This kind of happy-sad, this jubilant melancholia, is something that is perhaps very Nordic,” Björn added. “I don’t hear that in Germany or America or the U.K. or France. But in Swedish folk music, definitely. And then there’s the ladies’ voices together. The way it sounds is jubilant. Whatever they sing, however sad the song is, they manage to sound uplifting.”  

ABBA made pop with feeling and pop full of feelings, brimming with every emotion. The group mapped their wide emotional range on meticulously assembled songs such as “Dancing Queen” and “Mamma Mia,” “SOS” and “Take a Chance on Me.” 

But using this wide range as a blueprint for hooks sharp enough to cut glass took a toll. The work played out over years of love and pain, fan frenzy and flops. The story of ABBA is the story of climbing towering peaks and tumbling down hills over and over again—across two marriages and four intertwined careers—and squeezing that glory and chaos into a pop-music revolution.

The following is a selection of photos from LIFE’s new special tribute issue ABBA: Their Songs. Their Story. Their Lives.

Heilemann/Camera Press/Redux

ABBA, after their star-making performance at Eurovision in 1974. From left Annifrid Lyngstad, Agnetha Fältskog and Björn Ulvaeus, with Benny Andersson in the mirror.

IBL/Shutterstock

ABBA performed “Waterloo” on the British program Top of the Pops in 1974. From left to right: Benny Andersson, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Bjorn Ulvaeus, and Agnetha Faltskog.

David Redfern/Redferns/Getty Images

ABBA performed in Vastervik, Sweden, July 9, 1975.

IBL/Shutterstock

ABBA posed for a group portrait in Stockholm, April 1976. Left to right: Benny Andersson, Agnetha Faltskog, Bjorn Ulvaeus, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad.

Michael Putland/Hulton/Getty Images

ABBA’s Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson were surrounded by journalists during a flight to Warsaw in 1976.

Bjorn Larsson Ask/Kamerabild/TT/IBL/Shutterstock

ABBA arrived for a tour of the USA on Oct. 1, 1976.

Photo by Anwar Hussein/Getty Images)Anwar Hussein/Getty Images

ABBA”s Benny Andersson and Anni Frid Lyngstad at a Paris television show in 1978.

Photo by Bertrand Rindoff Petroff/Getty Images

ABBA—Benny Andersson, Agnetha Faltskog, Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Bjorn Ulvaeus—performed in Edmonton, Canada on the opening night of a North American tour in September 1979.

Andre Csillag/Shutterstock

Bjorn Ulvaeus (left) and Benny Andersson of ABBA practiced in the studio that they co-founded, Polar Studios, Stockholm, Sweden, July 1977.

Leif Skoogfors/Corbis/Getty Images

Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson of ABBA took a bow at the premiere of the musical ”Mamma Mia” on October 18, 2001 in New York.

Lawrence Lucier/Getty Images

Benny Andersson posed for a photoshoot on Oct. 20, 2021 in advance of the release of the new ABBA album Voyage.

IBL/Shutterstock

Yabba Dabbo Doo!: Inside Hanna-Barbera and “TV’s First Cartoon for Grownups”

The Nov 21, 1960 issue of LIFE heralded new beginnings, great and small. The cover of the issue showed John F. Kennedy—with wife Jackie, mother Rose and sister Eunice— fresh off his win in the 1960 presidential election, and the headline declared a “New Era in Government.”

Another story in that issue featured a family that would change the medium of television—the Flintstones. LIFE hailed their new show as “TV’s first Cartoon for Grownups.” The prime-time hit on ABC debuted on Sept. 30, 1960 and centered around the prehistoric lives of Fred and Wilma Flintstone and their friends Barney and Betty Rubble. LIFE described the show, set in the town of Bedrock, as a “a parody of modern togetherness” and added, “By poking fun at dozens of humorless comedies now on the air, The Flintstones gives a much needed boost to a generally dismal TV season.” Viewers agreed. The show ran for 166 episodes, through April 1966, and Fred’s cry of “Yabba Dabba Doo” became part of the American vernacular.

The creative minds behind the show were William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. The two had worked together as animators at MGM studios, where they had won seven Academy Awards for their Tom and Jerry shorts. In 1957 Hanna and Barbera left MGM to form their own company, and had their first hit with The Huckleberry Hound Show (which would produce an even more popular spinoff, The Yogi Bear Show. Hanna-Barbera also go on to produce such shows as The Jetsons and Scooby-Doo. Their mark on the world of animation was as gargantuan as any of the dinosaurs stomping around Bedrock.

In 1960, when The Flintstones was the hot new thing, LIFE photographer Allan Grant took a deep dive into the world of Hanna-Barbera. His pictures show Fred Flintstone and other company creations popping up in unlikely settings—at the boardroom, in the recording studio, floating in the pool at Hanna’s house. Some particularly interesting photos show the Hanna-Barbera artists at work in the days when animators relied on pen and ink rather than computers. In one photo a cartoonist makes an exaggerated face in the mirror to use as reference for drawing the same expression on Fred Flintstone.

The Flintstones may have been the first adult-friendly cartoon to air in prime time, but it certainly wasn’t the last. The mantle was picked up most notably by The Simpsons, which debuted in 1989 and continues its remarkable run today. (In a nod to the bond between the shows, in one episode Homer hilariously recreates the Flintstones’ opening sequence.. If The Flintstones succeeded because it featured the most interesting family on television, the same sentiment applies to The Simpsons—or Family Guy, South Park, BoJack Horseman and the other shows that carry on the legacy of adult animation that can be traced back to the town of Bedrock and the studios of Hanna-Barbera.

William Hanna, Joseph Barbera and their creations, 1960

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

William Hanna (left) and Joseph Barbera (right), 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

Joseph Barbera (right) and Fred Flinstone get down to business, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

Joseph Barbera (on the ground) at the offices of Hanna-Barbera, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

Animator Carlo Vinci at work on The Flintstones at Hanna-Barbera, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

Animator Carlo Vinci used a mirror to draw facial expressions of Fred Flinstone, Los Angeles, California, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

An animator works on Fred Flintstone at the offices of Hanna-Barbera, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The offices of Hanna-Barbera Productions, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Huckleberry Hound merchandise being made at Hanna-Barbera Productions, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear merchandise being made at Hanna-Barbera Productions, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear merchandise being made at Hanna-Barbera Productions, 1960. Yogi Bear debuted as a supporting character on The Huckleberry Hound Show before getting his own program in 1961.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Animator William Hanna at home, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Animator William Hanna at home, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joseph Barbera sitting by the pool with family, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Flintstones recording session at Hanna-Barbera studios, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Flintstones recording session at Hanna-Barbera studios, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Flintstones recording session at Hanna-Barbera studios, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Pictures/Shutterstock

A Flintstones recording session at Hanna-Barbera studios, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A bowling team at Hanna-Barbera, 1960.

Allan Grant/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Training with “The World’s First Paleo CrossFitting Locavore”

In its July 7, 1958 issue, LIFE magazine ran a story on track star Herb Elliott and his 63-year-old trainer Percy Cerutty, headlined “Odd Partners’ Odd Way to a Record Mile.” While the 20-year-old Elliott was a world-record holder who never lost a mile race, Cerutty was the star of the story.

Cerutty wasn’t your average coach. The Australian came to running late, quitting his job as a telephone technician in his early 40s following a bout with pneumonia. The former four-pack-a-day smoker remade his life around healthy habits and, inspired by a racetrack revelation about how humans could learn from the running style of horses, he eventually took up marathon running, completing his first race at the age of 51. “I started too late,” he lamented to LIFE. But he established a small compound on the Eastern coast of Australia to impart his wisdom to younger athletes, with Elliott becoming his star student.

His workout program was as distinctive as it was rigorous. He placed more emphasis on weight lifting—even if only for minimal reps—than in common in track, and pushed his students toward a natural and uninhibited running style. This story on The Science of Running website gets into the details of this training methods.

In general he advocated living as naturally as possible. Cerutty called his approach “Stotan”—half Stoic, half Spartan. (The method is called simply “Spartan” in the LIFE story, and one imagines a copy editor understandably fixing a perceived misspelling). In that LIFE story Cerutty advised, “Put zest and life into your work.” According to the story Elliott and Cerutty had “run barefoot marathons together, lifted weights, gone for ice-cold swims and dieted on oats, nuts and fruits.” The duo’s adventures were captured by LIFE photographer Leonard McCombe.

The unconventionality that attracted LIFE to Cerutty may have also stood in the way of his broader acceptance in the coaching world. But time has judged him kindly. In 2014 Christopher McDougall, author of the popular book Burn to Run, wrote appreciatively about Cerutty for OutsideOnline.com in a story titled “Lessons from the Paleo Guru History Forgot.” McDougall deemed Cerutty “the world’s first Paleo CrossFitting locavore.”

In recent years interest in Cerutty surged enough that his six fitness guides, such as Be Fit! or Be Damned! , were brought back into print. Even if his name is not broadly known, the ideas Cerutty advocated have gone further than he might ever have imagined.

Runner Herb Elliott (left) ran with his trainer Percy Cerutty, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Track star Herb Elliott and his trainer Percy Cerutty, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Percy Cerutty (left) and Herb Elliott lifted weights, an unconventional approach for a track coach, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Trainer Percy Cerutty, 63, with track star Herb Elliott, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Herb Elliott (foreground) and trainer Percy Cerutty (background), 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Runner Herb Elliott climbed a rope as part of his training with Percy Cerutty, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Runner Herb Elliott watched his trainer Percy Cerutty (foreground) lift weights.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Trainer Percy Cerutty (foreground) and track star Herb Elliott, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Runner Herb Elliott eating with his trainer Percy Cerutty (left), 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Runner Herb Elliott (L) with his trainer Percy Cerutty, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Runner Herb Elliott (left) ate ice cream with his trainer Percy Cerutty, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

During a round of golf runner Herb Elliott watched his trainer Percy Cerutty, a non-golfer, execute a headstand, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Trainer Percy Cerutty, 1958.

Leonard McCombe/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

When Scooters Became the Cool Way to Go

The most popular kind of scooter these days may be the standing electric scooter, which is seeing a boost in popularity because it provides the solution to a host of modern problems. Those standing scooters are an efficient way to make short trips around town without having to worry about either the environmental effects or the costs of gas usage, or the COVID concerns of riding public transportation. Scooters also aren’t a parking problem, especially if you live in one of the many cities with a scooter-sharing program.

The days after World War II saw the rise of a different kind of scooter—the kind that is more closely related to the motorcycle. (If you wish people would stop calling so many different two-wheeled modes of transportation “scooters” you are not alone). The scooters that took off in the post-war years have this in common with e-scooters: their burst in popularity was tied to the societal shifts of its day.

In Italy after World War II, the Vespa turned out to be the perfect vehicle for a war-torn country with bumpy roads and a bumpier economy. The Vespas were also fun and fashionable: in the great 1953 romantic comedy Roman Holiday, Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn had their day to remember as they scooted around town on a Vespa.

In the United States people also showed an affinity for this young form of two-wheeled travel, owing to a surplus of motorbikes being decommissioned by the army after the war, and also the former troops who rode in groups to reclaim some of the camaraderie of their service days.

LIFE photographers captured the rise of scooter culture on both sides on the Atlantic. In 1945 as the war was nearing its end, Wallace Kirkland documented the Cushman Motor Works in Nebraska, showing both the plant where scooters were made and also the locals enjoying their products. In Italy in 1948 Dmitri Kessel photographed people on Vespas for an essay on Europe coming back to life after the war.

Those motor scooters have been on the decline in popularity in recent years as electric sales surge. But when they had their moment, it sure looked fun.

Vespa riders in Italy, 1948.

Dmitri Kessel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mother and baby rode a Vespa scooter in Italy, 1948.

Dmitiri Kessel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A police officer directed scooter traffic in Italy, 1948.

Dmitri Kessel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scooter rider and a cyclist chatted on the street in Italy, 1948.

Dmitri Kessel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A parking lot for Vespa scooters in Italy, 1948.

Dmitri Kessel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Nebraska was a center of scooter production in America, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Outside the Cushman Motor Works scooter plant in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Outside the Cushman Motor Works scooter plant in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Inside the Cushman Motor Works scooter plant, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scooter enthusiast in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Scooter enthusiasts in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Scooter riders in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Scooter enthusiasts in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scooter rider in Nebraska, 1945.

Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

LIFE Launches Collection of NFTs From Iconic Photographs

This month LIFE joins other major collections like the Associated Press and the British Museum to launch its own set of NFTs.

NFTS (non-fungible tokens) are one-of-a-kind digital items with blockchain-managed ownership. LIFE will collaborate with the NFT marketplace KnownOrigin, and distribute exclusive drops of their iconic photographs via their profile, beginning with the first on April 14.  

Founded in 1936, LIFE, the first photography publication in the United States, coined the term “photo essay” and established a unique visual storytelling style in popular culture. With work from trailblazing photographer Margaret Bourke-White, the first drop offers the opportunity for serious collectors to own selected authentic, important pieces of photography from the cover essay of LIFE’s first issue.

“LIFE always seeks to share its incredible photography with new communities,” said Tom Rowland, President of the Picture Collection. “There is a growing number of photography enthusiasts on Web3, and we see this as a way to engage with new audiences around photojournalism and art.”

David Moore, one of the KnownOrigin co-founders commented, “We are delighted that LIFE has partnered with KnownOrigin to launch their journey into NFTs. LIFE is an iconic and historically important brand with compelling and instantly recognizable imagery, including famous LIFE magazine covers…We have recently seen photography grow in importance and collectability within the NFT community. The LIFE Picture Collection is unrivaled in its breadth and variety of awe-inspiring content. It’s an honor to have LIFE on our platform.”

The drop will include an auction with a reserve, rare editions, and other pieces with a larger limited run and items will be priced according to their rarity. It will also be accompanied by Twitter Spaces and a new LIFE Discord channel to connect audiences with the brand.

LIFE and KnownOrigin will feature a virtual gallery in Decentraland on KnownOrigin’s plot of land. As a continuation of LIFE’s cutting-edge philosophy, the gallery will form an immersive world celebrating LIFE’s inception and its digital form. The LIFE gallery platform will display NFTS and additional LIFE photography, allowing collectors to display their unique pieces.

LIFE will offset any emissions generated from the NFT minting process from sales. A portion of the proceeds from the NFT sales will also be donated to charities chosen by the LIFE team, with the first drop benefitting the Malala Fund. 

Here’s an exclusive first look at the first pieces we’ll be releasing as NFTs on KnownOrigin.

LIFE’s first cover on November 23, 1963 of Fort Peck Dam.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

Original print of first LIFE Cover from 1936, that will be on view at our largest retrospective to date, at the Boston MFA, in October 2022.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

A contact sheet from 1936 of aerial views of Fort Peck Dam’s landscape.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

Portrait of LIFE’s first hired and first female staff photographer, Margaret Bourke-White. She was on assignment in Algeria, standing in front of Flying Fortress bomber in which she made combat mission photographs of the U.S. attack on Tunis, 1943.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

A workman crawls inside a giant pipe segment, Fort Peck, Montana. The pipe, divided by latticelike support struts, was used to divert the flow of the Missouri River during construction of the Fort Peck dam, 1936.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

View of New Deal, Montana, which was one of the six shack towns around the US work relief construction project of the Fort Peck Dam in Fort Peck, Montana, 1936.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

Two children leaning against a sign reading “Entering New Deal, Speed Limit 25 Miles Per Hour” marking the boundary of New Deal, one of the shanty towns which have grown up around the work-relief project at Fort Peck Dam in Montana, 1936.

(Margaret Bourke-White/ LIFE Picture Collection /Shutterstock)

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