Saul Leiter

Saul Leiter

Saul Leiter is an American artist and photographer. As a teenager, he studied painting and photography in Pittsburgh and moved to New York. Saul Leiter Street Photography Collection inspired me. Saul Leiter’s entire Street Photography Collection is about standing at the crossroads of fashion and abstract expression of street photography. The series is influenced by shapes, colors, and turning reality into Saul Leiter’s own vision. In my opinion, Saul Leiter’s photography often includes blurry subjects, reflections of the rainwater or window, and motion to create a unique abstract expression. Saul Leiter once said that everything is worth photographing. Walking in the streets of New York, he shot everything with the kind of freedom that allowed him to experiment with his photos.

Package, 1960

The photograph shows a passenger with a package in his hand and walking in the land of snow behind a moist glass window. The first time I saw this photo, my eye was drawn to the massive man in the middle and how his body was blurry. I like how he settled the image into a cold color tone. I like how he leaves the man blurry to show that he is moving and uses the raindrop to decorate the frame further. He used Negative space to leave enough empty space around the subject, the man in the middle. He also used raindrops to frame the whole photo. The entire image didn’t use many light techniques. Still, the tiny light source beam in the top left corner is attractive and unique. Looking at his body movement and facial expression, I assume the man is in a hurry or too cold and wants to find somewhere warm. His blurry figure shows that he is moving fast. In this photo, the technique used depth of field to throw different parts of an image in and out of focus. While this sometimes brought attention to a subject in the photo, it was also a way to simply play with abstracting objects. The artist used a long shutter speed to preserve the figure of the man and show the message of how fast rhythm is in New York City; Everyone is in a hurry. Leiter focused the camera on nowhere; the raindrops are the most straightforward thing you can visually see in this image. From looking at this image, he used an extended depth of field aperture setting. This use of an extended depth of field aperture setting tells the view where he purposely blurred. He must used a shutter speed that is not too short cause you know he reserves the motion, and I really like it.

How Does the image inspire?

Saul Leiter’s street collection highly inspired me by his unique perspective of framing and how he connects reflection with this kind of blurry motion style. Leiter has said that he never went searching for a photo. The photos, instead, will come to you. By simply standing in a place and being observant, you will notice that, while standing at one point and looking carefully, there are always tremendous and unique scenes you can take. I tried this idea once in ISB because my legs hurt too much. I was sitting in one spot, and I found a lot of super special and unique scenes. I will also try his technique of relating this motion photo with a reflection by taking a photo in the rain, after the rain, or behind a piece of glass.

https://www.eyeem.com/blog/10-lessons-we-can-learn-from-street-photographer-saul-leiter

https://www.saulleiterfoundation.org/