Biography

Lejaren à Hiller (1880 –1969) pioneered advertising photography for an industry dominated by text and an occasional line drawing. An advertising and editorial photographer in early twentieth-century America, Hiller began his career as an illustrator.  He first recognized photography’s potential as a persuasive method to sell products and services, as well as illustrating magazine stories. Best known for his large and exquisitely detailed studio sets that often depicted historical scenarios or exotic foreign lands, Hiller produced thousands of photographs for a variety of clients.

The focus of Jeannette Klute’s career at Eastman Kodak Company was on new discoveries in color photography, in particular, the Dye Transfer color process. Klute adopted the laborious Dye Transfer process in the interest of highlighting landscape and natural settings. She promoted environmental concerns in her views, joining a small group of landscape modernists including Elliot Porter, who chose the new aesthetics of advanced color technology over the conventional appearance of black and white nature settings.

Lella and Massimo Vignelli: Two Lives, One Vision is a portrait of two important twentieth-century designers whose careers intertwined since the 1950s. The Vignellis promote a modernist philosophy of designing for a better society: resourceful use of space and materials, clear communication, lasting quality, and logical functionality.