University of California Berkeley Regional Oral History Office University of California The Bancroft Library Berkeley, California Wayne F. Miller AN EYE ON THE WORLD: REVIEWING A LIFETIME IN PHOTOGRAPHY With an Introduction by Daniel Dixon Interviews Conducted by Suzanne B. Riess in 2001 Copyright 2003 by The Regents of the University of California Since 1954 the Regional Oral History Office has been interviewing leading participants in or well-placed witnesses to major events in the development of northern California, the West, and the nation. Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through tape-recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. The tape recording is transcribed, lightly edited for continuity and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewee. The corrected manuscript is indexed, bound with photographs and illustrative materials, and placed in The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and in other research collections for scholarly use. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account, offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is reflective, partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ************************************ All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between The Regents of the University of California and Wayne F. Miller, dated August 3, 2001. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the Regional Oral History Office, 486 Bancroft Library, Mail Code 6000, University of California, Berkeley 94720-6000, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Wayne F. Miller, "An Eye on the World: Reviewing a Lifetime in Photography," an oral history conducted in 2001, by Suzanne B. Riess, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 2003. Copy no. Wayne Miller Photograph by Joe Munroe Cataloging Information: Wayne F. Miller (b. 1918) An Eye on the World: Reviewing a Lifetime in Photography. 2003, ix, 195pp. Chicago background, family, early experiences with a camera, Art Center School; Naval Photographic unit, Edward Steichen, Hiroshima; Guggenheim to document the northern Negro, 1946-1947; work for Life and other magazines; move to the West Coast, a house in Orinda; the thoughts on "getting shot," darkrooms, other photographers, museums, the market for photography, teaching; cover photography; discusses assignments, favorite stories, the birth series; creating the Family ofMan and The World is Young; role with American Society of Magazine Photographers, and Magnum agency; moving on to become a forest landowner. Introduction by Daniel Dixon. Interviewed 2001 by Suzanne Riess. The Wayne F. Miller interview was made possible by a generous grant from the Sophie S. McFarland Memorial Fund of the Bancroft Library. TABLE OF CONTENTS--Wayne Miller INTRODUCTION by Daniel Dixon i INTERVIEW HISTORY v BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION ix Interview I Gordon Parks, Challenging Oneself 1 Pictures Photographing Blacks, "Making" and "Taking" 5 Family Background 7 Chicago Neighborhood and Friends 9 More on Parents 1 3 First Camera, First Photography Job 17 Equipment Details 1 8 Art Center School of Photography 21 Interview II The War and the Naval Photographic Unit 27 First Meeting Steichen 30 Particulars, Cameras, Captioning 32 Battle Stations 34 The Children of Naples 3 6 War Photographers, Conditioned to "Shoot" 37 The Bomb, Hiroshima 39 The Dealers, Collectors, Print Quality Questions 45 Thinking about Picture Magazines and Information, and Museum Openings 47 Marriage to Joan 50 Interview III Newsweek Covers, Marshall McLuhan 51 The Doukhobors 52 Editorial Struggles with Life Magazine Space, Layout, Rate 54 Sputnik 56 Close-ups, Rapport, Photographing Children 57 Thoughts on Cameras, Getting the Shot, Art, Beauty, Et Cetera 58 The Birth Series 62 Baby s First Year and the Captions 64 Problems of Teaching, Chicago Institute of Design 65 Photographing "The Way of Life of the Northern Negro," Chicago 68 The Market and a Gallery in New York 71 The Continued Value of the Project, Terkel Interview 72 The West Coast, Viewed from the Time-Life Building 76 Interview IV Moving West: Choosing a Community in California 79 Architectural Decisions 81 Working from a California Base 84 Assignments: Loyalty Oath, Science, Sally Stanford 86 Assignments: Farmer s Wife, Jayne Mansfield, John Wayne 89 Assignments: Korean War, Migrant Workers, Thoughts on News and Privacy 91 Assignment: Richard Nixon, Thoughts on Job Tensions 96 Other Bay Area Photographers 1 00 Interview V World Trade Center Bombing, 9/11, and Photographing War 103 A Conversation about Intentions 1 05 9/11 Images 107 Too Good to be True 1 09 The Idea of The Family ofMan 1 1 Gathering and Choosing the Photographs 1 12 Legitimizing the Snapshot 115 The Millers, and Steichen 116 Paul Rudolph, Designing the Exhibition 117 Interview VI Photography in Museums 121 Shirley Burden 123 Darkrooms and Papers and So On 125 Gene Smith s "Paradise Garden" 128 March 1955, The Show Closes and Wayne Moves On 130 On to The World is Young 1 3 1 American Society of Magazine Photographers 134 Magnum Picture Agency 136 Disaffection Sets In 140 Interview VII Steichen and the Millers 143 Becoming Forest Landowner 144 Non-Industrial Timber Management Plan 147 A View of the Environmental Movement 150 A View of Wayne 1 52 Special Assistant to the Director of the National Park Service, NEED 155 TAPE GUIDE 161 APPENDICES 163 APPENDIX A Biographical information, current to 200 1 . 165 APPENDIX B 1995 summary of Wayne F. Miller s body of work. 167 APPENDIX C Newspaper release announcing Meritorius Service Award to Wayne F. Miller from the National Park Service. 1 69 APPENDIX D Plans for work, written in 1946. "The Way of Life of the Northern Negro in the United States." Notes to self in March and November 1946. Notes on a visit to Provident Hospital emergency room written in November 1 946. Notes from June 1947 work. 171 APPENDIX E Unedited notes written in 2002 for possible inclusion in oral history. 1 89 INDEX 193 INTRODUCTION by Daniel Dixon I own a print of the eloquent photograph you see here. Wayne gave it to me for a very compelling reason. I had the guts to ask for it. We have a valued friendship, Wayne and I. It reaches back over fifty years and entitles both of us to ask the other guy for occasional favors. Whenever I m in Wayne s neighborhood, I invite myself to dinner and usually expect to be spared the expense of a hotel. In return, I provide Wayne with some editorial yard work that he seems to find helpful. The beauty of his print only partly explains why I get by far the best of the bargain. The photograph is placed in our living room. It s surrounded by a cluster of portraits by Dorothea Lange, another friend of Wayne s. Nobody ever interpreted the human face with greater understanding and sensitivity than my mother, but our visitors are more insistently drawn to Wayne s study of his troubled daughter Dana than to any of the neighboring Langes. They look, look again, and then begin to ask questions. Who is this child? they want to know. Why is she weeping? Is it grief? Rage? Humiliation? Loneliness? Injustice? Is this the ending of a tempest? Or is it just the beginning? Different folks, different strokes. Each viewer has his or her own theory. But on one point almost everybody agrees. They find the photograph strangely unsettling. "It makes me slightly uncomfortable," some people admit, and I think I know why. I, like others, feel pierced by the purity of Dana s gaze. She looks straight at me, into me, through me. Those eyes seem to perceive my weaknesses, my pretensions, my hypocrisiesmy secret self. They reproach me. I can t look at the photograph for more than a minute or so. Then I have to glance away. Many of Wayne s photographs the photographs I like best-are also mysterious. They re not declarations or prophecies. They preach no sermons, sound no trumpets, lead no charges. They simply suggest possibilities. The stories they tell are still unfinished, and we can only guess at their endings. That s not very surprising, because Wayne himself is an enigmatic man. He rarely talks about himself, and then only with restraint. He seldom mentions his dreams and never his nightmares. Not once in all the years we ve known each other have I ever heard him curse. Though not distant, he s detached. At this or that event or family gathering, he usually lingers at the edge of the laughter and the conversation, somewhere between the light and the shadows. My wife once asked him why, with half a life still ahead of him, he decided that he no longer wanted to "I tired the he answered. "I wanted to be a photographer. was of being on outside, looking in," join the party." Well, perhaps. But that was many years ago, and nothing much seems to have changed.