Margaret Bourke-White
She is best known as the first foreign photographer permitted to take pictures of the Soviet five-year plan, the first American female war photojournalist (flew in combat on a B-17!), and to have her photograph on the cover of the first issue of Life.
The current hagiographers of Maier, Lange, et al pay scant attention to the trail Bourke-White blazed for their subjects.
Look at her images of the Dust Bowl she shot for Fortune, the images of concentration camp survivors, her commercial images. They still make my jaw drop.
Although the word “iconic” has become debased through overuse, her image of Gandhi at his spinning wheel is that: “iconic”. It captures the essence of the man and his ideas.
