Artist of the day, February 14: Leonard Nimoy

Leonard Nimoy (1931-2015) was an American actor, film director, photographer, author, singer and songwriter. He is an artist’s artist and a photographer’s photographer. His obsession with the camera and the power of the photographic image, initially an infatuation with black and white imagery, began in his teens. An extended study with UCLA’s legendary Robert Heineken only heightened his determination to use photography as a means to create works of art.

Guided by a visceral appreciation of classical and modern art forms, Nimoy’s eye is in pursuit of a re-animated expression of the sublime. His early nude studies are fleshy expressions of shadow unfolding through form. The Egg Series explores, in an essentially abstract format, the possibility of matter and motion being communicated via shape or line. The Borghese Series, executed while in Rome on a fellowship from the American Academy, began with a fixation on sculpture, specifically “Paulina” by Canova. How to translate the sensual impact of marble and a somewhat steamy back-story into a photograph? His current work, the White project, shot in color and printed digitally in a large-scale format, is an exquisitely literal investigation of the photograph’s ability to imitate and then re-invent the evanescence of marble sculpture. Stone made flesh made image made alive; perhaps that articulates Nimoy’s ongoing quest for expressions of the entirely human in the aesthetically sublime.

Mr. Nimoy’s photography has been exhibited nationally and internationally and is included in a number of private and public collections, including LACMA, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Bakersfield Museum, the Houston Museum of Fine Arts and the Jewish Museum in NY. Louis Stern Fine Arts represents the artist and featured the work from his most recent book project, "The Full Body Project-Photography of Leonard Nimoy".

With each photographic project, though his curiosity may initially have been intellectual or even technical (Leonard fell in love with the camera as a boy and delighted in the accomplishment of a good print) he always circled back to notions of identity, of authenticity.  Communication mattered.  Provoking meaningful conversation mattered.  Images served as emissaries for the thoughtful provocations of the photographer and Leonard seemed to enjoy all aspects of the process.

Certainly the conversations engendered by his photography will continue.  There will be exhibitions.  Prints can be re-printed.  But we’ll miss Leonard Nimoy the photographer - the one behind the camera who ‘spoke’ so eloquently without saying a word.

© 2018. All images are copyrighted © by Leonard Nimoy. The use of any image from this site is prohibited unless prior written permission from the artist is obtained.

Mr Leonard Nimoy

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

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From "The Full Body Project"

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From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"

From "The Full Body Project"