Hy Peskin (1915-2005) was probably the first great American sports photographer. He was the guy who moved the camera from the press box to the sideline at baseball, football, and basketball games. The move revolutionized sports photography and made it recognizably modern.
Peskin was also the first staff photographer at Sports Illustrated. That made him an all-rounder, shooting everything from boxing to surfing to motosports.
Hy Peskin: Juan Manuel Fangio, Havana, 1957. (Photo copyright Hy Peskin, Inc., 2011.)
Peskin made this gorgeous photo while covering first Grand Prix of Cuba, in 1957. That's Juan Manuel Fangio -- considered by many to be the greatest racer of all time -- passing the battleship Maine memorial in his Maserati 300S. He won the race, with Carroll Shelby, in a Ferrari 410 Sport, taking second.
I like this photo for all sorts of reasons. It's shot with a relatively wide lens, something that was common in sports photography of the day, so we get a strong sense of the setting -- the crowd, the Malecon, the memorial, the sea... Peskin has panned beautifully, creating an image in which only the subject -- man and machine -- are sharply in focus. Everything else is softened by motion blur. The effect is wonderful. (By the way, you can click directly on the photo to see a much larger version.)
I'm not sure I'd call Peskin an artist. But he certainly had a terrific eye and virtuoso technique. You can see much more of his work, here.
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