Kathryn Abbe

Kathryn Abbe
Abbe at her house in 2005
Born	Kathryn McLaughlin (1919-09-22)September 22, 1919 Brooklyn,New York City, U.S.
Died	January 18, 2014(2014-01-18)(aged 94)
Education	Photography degree, 1941
Alma mater	Pratt Institute,New School for Social Research
Occupation	Photographer
Employer(s)	Vogue,freelance photography
Known for	Photographs inVogue,Better Homes and Gardens,McCall's,Parents,andGood Housekeeping;a book,Twins on Twins,written with her twin sister
Spouse	James Abbe Jr. (m. 1946)
Children	3
Relatives	Frances McLaughlin-Gill (twin sister) Tomie dePaola(cousin)
Awards	Prix de Paris, 1941

Kathryn Abbe(September 22, 1919 – January 18, 2014) was an American photographer.

Early life and education

Kathryn Abbe was born Kathryn McLaughlin in 1919, inBrooklyn.Her twin sister was photographerFrances McLaughlin-Gill.They were raised inWallingford, Connecticut,and were thevaledictorianandsalutatorianof their graduating class atLyman Hall High School.Abbe attended thePratt Institute,where she studied under Walter Civardi and painterReginald Marsh;she graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1941. She also attended theNew School for Social Researchfrom 1939 until 1941, where she studied underYasuo Kuniyoshi.In 1946, she married photographer James Abbe Jr., the son of the Hollywood photographerJames Abbe.The couple had three children. She and her sister were the cousins of artistTomie dePaola.

Career

Abbe wonVoguemagazine's Prix de Paris photography award in 1941. By 1942, she was working forVogueunderToni Frissell;she left the magazine and became a professional freelance photographer in 1944 – one of few women to hold the position at the time.Although in the 1940s she photographedNew EnglandandBrooklynextensively,by the mid-1940s her assignments took her around the world, notably to Paris, Havana, New York, Rome and Milan. Her subjects often included fashion icons, entertainment personalities, children, street vignettes, and artists.Her photographs ofCarmen Dell'OreficeandLisa Fonssagrivesare particularly striking.Her work was published in over eighty books and international periodicals, among them,Better Homes and Gardens,McCall's,Cosmopolitan,Good Housekeeping,Paris Match,andVogue.She was awarded more than twenty major magazine covers – a rare achievement for a female photographer of her time.

A co-author of three books,Stars of the Twenties Observed by James Abbe(1974),Twins on Twins,(with her twin sister, 1980), andTwin Lives in Photography(2011), Abbe lectured extensively and appeared on many television programs, among them, theDick Cavett Show.A 2000 documentary,Twin Lenses,was produced about the lives and careers of Kathryn Abbe and Frances McLaughlin–Gill.

Further reading

• Corbett, Cynthia Arps (1985).Useful art: Long Island pottery.Setauket, L.I., N.Y.: Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities.ISBN0939432005.
• Rosenblum, Naomi (2014).A History of Women Photographers(Third ed.). Abbeville, New York. p. 432.ISBN9780789212245.{{cite book}}:CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Abbe, Kathryn.Twin lives in photography.New York: Abbe-Gill Press, 2011.

External links

• Official website
• "ART REVIEWS; Preserving the Island's Artifacts, and Classic Images"fromThe New York Times
• About Kathryn Abbe
• Vogue: Kathryn Abbe