Boris Ignatovich

Contents

1. Life

Boris Vsevolodovich Ignatovich was born on April 4, 1899 in the city of Slutsk (the Russian Empire, Minsk province) into a family of a teacher of mathematics in the senior classes of a gymnasium. From 1908 to 1914 he studied at the gymnasium in the city of Lodz (Poland), and from 1914 in the gymnasium of Lugansk (Ukraine). Boris Ignatovich was expelled from the Lugansk gymnasium in 1917 for publication of a handwritten magazine, Shantrapa, and participation in revolutionary disturbances. In 1918 he graduated from the Vyborg gymnasium in Petrograd with a silver medal, and returned to Lugansk. There he began work as a journalist for the newspaper Severo-donetskiy kommunist.

In 1919–1920 he joined the Communist Party. He worked as an editorial assistant in Kharkov newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda and Kiev newspaper Vseizdat, then as a managing editor of the newspaper Krasnaya Bashkiria (Ufa, Bashkortostan). He was also in charge of the regional office of ROSTA (Russian Telegraph Agency) in Sterlitamak. He became one of the first members of the Russian Union of Soviet Journalists (1918), and participated in the First All-Union Congress of Journalists.

In 1921–22 he was appointed deputy editor and then chief editor of the Moscow newspaper Gornyak. However, for publishing allegedly unverified rabkor (worker-correspondent) letters he was demoted from membership in the Communist Party and made a candidate member. As well, he was dismissed from his job as editor. Soon he went to Leningrad, where he headed the editorial boards of Leningrad comic magazines Drezina, Smekhach and Buzotyor.

In 1923 he made his first photo report: a snapshot of writer Mikhail Zoshchenko buying apples, taken with a pocket Kodak camera at editorial office of the magazine Smekhach in Petrograd. In 1925 he was restored to the ranks of the Communist Party and returned to Moscow, where he worked as a managing editor of the magazine Rabochaia nedelia in illustrative annex to the newspaper Trud.

In 1926 he bought his first cameras: reflex Nettel (9x12) and huge metal Voigtländer (10x15). He participated in an exhibition of photographic reporting organized by the Association of Moscow Photographers for the Press House (Moscow). In 1927 he went to the well-known in those years’ newspaper Bednota (Moscow) as a press photographer, shooting film on rural life, Volkhovstroy and the first Soviet-made turbines. In 1928 the editor assigned him to shoot the Ludorvaiskiy trial of rich peasants (kulaks) in Udmurtia. In 1929 eighteen of his photos graced the pages of Sovetskoe foto, in ten issues, two of them on the cover.

From 1929 he was a professional photographer for the magazines Sovremennaia arkhitektura, avant-garde Daesh' (which published 13 of his photo essays), Radioslushatel' and Illiustrirovannaia rabochaia gazeta. He was one of the first photographers to use the German small format Leica. A series of frames taken with this camera was published on the pages of the magazines Soviet Photo (The New Harvest, Krasnoarmeets, Group Portrait, In the Barnyard), and Daesh'. He participated in the photo exhibition of the Society of Friends of Soviet Cinema (Obshestvo Druzey Sovetskogo Kino - ODSK, Moscow), at which time he met Alexander Rodchenko. He also participated in the legendary modernist exhibition Film and Photo (exhibition of Art Photography) in Vienna (Austria) and Stuttgart (Germany).

"A. Rodchenko: It's a pleasure to look at you works. It makes me want to take pictures

B. Ignatovich: And do you think you weren't influencing my work?"

Varvara Stepanova

In 1930 he shot the documentary film Today at the Soiuz-kinokhronika studio, to the screenplay of Esphir Shub. The magazine Kino i Zhizn' (Cinema and Life) published a number of stills from the film (1930, № 21). He also participated in the creation of one of the first sound films Olympiad of Art. In 1931 he worked as a photojournalist of the publishing house Izogiz. Together with photographer N. Shtertser, he made an extensive series of aerial surveys of Leningrad from an R-5 reconnaissance plane for a special issue of Izogiz's magazine, USSR in Construction (№ 11, 1931).

Together with Alexander Rodchenko he led the photo section of the group October, until its dissolution in April 1932 (October was an umbrella organization with sections devoted to various arts and genres). The photo section became an independent creative photographic association, which is known in the history of Soviet photography as October Group. He took part in group exhibition in the Press House in 1931.

In 1932 he was elected chairman of the Moscow association of photo journalists. In 1932–34, working as a film maker for Soiuzkinohronika, he shot a documentary film How the Kukryniksy work, as well as the documentary film of the director A. Egorov The Electrification of the USSR. In 1934–35 he headed the department of illustrations of the newspaper Vecherniaia Moskva (Evening Moscow), and contributed to newspapers like Pravda, Rabochaya gazeta, Trud, and Komsomolskaya pravda, plus the magazines Projector, Krasnaya niva, Ogonyok, Smena, and Soviet Photo.

In the mid-1930-s the so-called Brigade Ignatovich acquired special prominence. It provided images for the newspaper Evening Moscow and the photo agency Soiuzfoto. In the Brigade along with Boris Ignatovich were E. Langman, J. Brodsky, L. Bach, Olga Ignatovich and Elizaveta Ignatovich.

"One time in 1936 I asked Rodchenko whom of the contemporary photographers he respected the most.

Above all Ignatovich. He has not only the keen eye of a reporter, but good taste. He's a gifted lad, a true artist"

Alexander Berezin

In 1935–36 he did a series of reports on the Stakhanov movement, and a photoseries called Cossacks. From 1936 to 1937 he worked as a photo reporter for Komsomol'skaia pravda. In 1937-38 he took part in the First All-Union exhibition of photographic art (at Moscow's Pushkin Art Museum, Leningrad’s Russian Museum, and Kiev). From 1937 to 1941 he worked as a staff photojournalist for the magazine Construction of Moscow, continuing to cooperate with the magazine USSR in Construction. In 1938 he participated in an exhibition of Soviet photography in Kaunas (Lithuania) and in 1938–39 – in an international photo exhibition in England.

From the first days of the Great Patriotic War he was a military photographer for the newspaper Boevoe Znamia of 30th army on the Kalinin front. He kept up with the action in various sectors on horseback, reporting on everything from sapper squads to cavalry, snipers, scouts, front line barbers, and field kitchens. His photos were chronicles, vignettes, genre scenes, group and personal portraits.

In 1943–44 he was sent by studio of military photographers of M.B. Grekov to the Western and Briansk fronts. In Briansk region he worked with the partisan detachments. At the Potsdam Conference in 1945 he took photos of Marshal Zhukov signing the Potsdam Declaration. From 1943 to 1950 he worked in the studio of M.B. Grekov as a military photographer. In 1950 he was discharged with the rank of captain. This was when he made his first forays into color photography. He photographed landscapes, and devoted much time to portrait photography.

He worked as a photographer for the Pravda publishing house and the magazine Ogonyok in 1950–51, and then as photo artist of technical workshops at the All-Union agricultural exhibition (VSKhV). There in 1952 ha set up a color photography laboratory. In 1953–54 he was working as a photo artist for publishing house Izogiz, and participated in the exhibition Photo Art of the USSR, 40 years, in Moscow. He worked as a photographer for Zhurnal mod (1954–55), in Stroiizdat (1955–56), and headed a department at the publishing house Iskusstvo. In 1957 publication of the magazine Soviet Photo was resumed, and he worked about a year on the literary side. In the years 1959 to 1965 he supervised a photo studio in the factory Serp i molot, consulted for the photo studio club Trudovye rezervy, and led the photo reporting section in the country's biggest photography club, Novator (Moscow), taking part in club exhibitions.

"It was impossible to live with Boris Ignatovich and not help him in his work, because he lived and breathed this work, and filled the atmosphere around him with it. Everyone who knew Boris Vsevolodovich was inspired with sympathy and love for him. He was a big artist and charming person.

He didn't like half measures or slapdash work. Whatever it might take, everything had to be done just right. At rest he was easygoing, cheerful, relating to everyone with a sense of humor, while in work he was as rigorous as can be. Ignatovich developed his film himself, and he printed it himself, explaining - How could a darkroom technician know what I saw in a shot?

The last years of his life centered on his communal apartment on Lenin Prospect. Young photo aficionados would visit to present their work and try to learn from Ignatovich. I served as an assistant, a photo model, and a cook for him.

Boris Vsevolodovich was working until the very last"

Klavdia Ignatovich. Wife and Archivist.

Passed away on the 8th of July, 2015. She is buried in Rogozhskoe cemetery in Moscow.

"Your plans for the future?

I have only one plan. To learn how to shoot photos well.

Isn't it a bit late for you?

Titian painted his masterpiece Venus with a Mirror when he was 90, and I've only just turned 70.

There's time"

Leonid Volkov-Lannit speaking with Boris Ignatovich

Boris Ignatovich left us on the 4th of April, 1976. He is buried in Rogozhskoe cemetery in Moscow.

2. Works

3. Legacy

The Innovator Foundation: Boris Ignatovich Estate Collection. Moscow, Russia www.borisignatovich.com

4. Collections

5. Exhibitions

6. Quotes

"His wartime photographs are photographs of men, remaining men – notwithstanding all the hardship, deprivation, cruelty, and death around them. They are not heroes. They are men, simply men. When you look at Ignatovich's photographs, it seems that all his life he took pictures of good people. Or maybe that's just because there weren't any bad people around him?"

Valeriy Stigneev. Photography Historian, Photographer, Writer

"The history of photography in the 20th century was greatly influenced by outstanding talents. One of the talents is Boris Ignatovich. His unmistakable artistic signature has left a significant mark on Soviet photography of the 1920's and 30's. His attempt to give reportage photography a completely new effect using new forms and photo experimentation makes Ignatovich one of the most interesting photographers"

Alex Lahman. Collector, expert

"Boris Ignatovich was a universal photographer. He was a journalist and a reporter, a war photographer, a portraitist, a pedagogue, and a master of applied photography. Ignatovich's own prints were unrepeatable artworks of his darkroom. Master didn't do any retouching, but achieved his effects by exposing different parts of the print so as to maximize depth and space, sharpen the message, accentuate the compositional center, and bring out the color texture of the subject. The tonal richness of Ignatovich's prints is akin to painting. He turned photographs into art, because he understood what art is. But he was not imitating painting. It all flowed from his technique, from what he'd seen, from mastery"

Aleksandr Lavrent'ev. Art Historian, grandson of the photographer Alexander Rodchenko, Director of the Rodchenko-Stepanova archive

"In youth we all fantasize desperately. I could make myself believe many things then. But I never would have believed that I would become a professional photographer"

Boris Ignatovich

7. External links

www.borisignatovich.com