Lennart Nilsson (photographer)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lennart Nilsson (2014)

Lennart Nilsson (born August 22, 1922 in Strängnäs ; † January 28, 2017 in Stockholm ) was a Swedish photographer and science filmmaker . His pioneering work consists in taking pictures of embryos and microscopic pictures of human body tissue, bacteria and viruses.

Photographer Lennart Nilsson

Originally a photojournalist, he became known for his science photography from 1953 . In 1955 he presented his first exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 1965, New York Life magazine published his embryo photos in the April 30 issue, along with a contribution from him as the cover story. Also in 1965 was the first edition of his book A Child Arises , which has been published in numerous revisions to this day and which was translated into English in 1967 and from there into many other languages. The documentary Das Wunder des Lebens ( PBS 1983) caused a sensation , which accompanies the journey of a sperm to the egg cell with a ' subjective camera ', so to speak .

Nilsson's recordings and descriptions shaped the popular notion of how a fetus emerges and grows in the womb - for the first time they made something visible to the general public that was previously only visualizable in pathologies and for medical professionals. In addition, the images had their own aesthetic : the fetuses glowed reddish-transparent against a dark background and seemed to float in the womb. A picture became famous in which the fetus holds the thumb close to the mouth as if it were sucking on it. The rhetoric of the texts accompanying the pictures and films was carried by the pathos of the great journey of discovery into the human being.

His most famous book on prenatal development, A Child Is Born , was preceded by eleven years of preparation. The new edition from 1990 also required more than five years of work. In the recent past he has made recordings of cells and their fine structures, of life and disease processes, of bacteria and viruses - among other things for his book A Journey Into Our Body . For this he used the scanning electron microscope technology.

Lennart Nilsson was a member of the Swedish Society for Medicine and an honorary member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the IMF Knowledge and Media . His work has received three Emmys awards. He received an honorary doctorate in 2002 from the Technical University of Braunschweig and from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm , where he also had his laboratory. In 1980 he received the Hasselblad Award . A prize has now been named after him, the Lennart Nilsson Prize, which is endowed with 100,000 Swedish kronor (11,000 euros).

Works

Photojournalist Lennart Nilsson at Arlanda airport near Stockholm , taken by colleague Erik Collin in 1946

Books

  • Lennart Nilsson et al. a .: Ett barn blir till. En bildskildring av de nio månaderna före före födelsen (Photos: Lennart Nilsson; Text: Axel Ingelman-Sundberg and Claes Wirsén). Albert Bonnier, Stockholm 1965. - Engl .: The everyday miracle. A child is born . Translated by Britt and Claes Wirsén, Annabelle MacMillan. Allen Lane / Penguin Press, London 1967. - German: A child is born. Image documentation about the development of human life in the womb . German Arr .: Hellmuth Merkl. Bertelsmann, Gütersloh 1967. 160 pages. - Adult new edition a. d. T. A child is born. Photo documentation about the development of life in the womb (Photos: Lennart Nilsson. Text: Lars Hamberger. Translator: Angelika Kutsch). Mosaik-Verlag, Munich 1990. 213 pages. ISBN 3-570-04918-3
  • Lennart Nilsson et al. a .: Så blev du till. En fotoberättelse (photos: Lennart Nilsson; text: Jan Cornell and Rune Petterson; medical advice: Axel Ingelman-Sundberg; drawings: Per Birger Lundquist). Albert Bonnier, Stockholm 1975. - Engl .: How you began. A story in pictures . Kestrel Books, Harmondsworth 1975. - German: This is how you came into the world. From conception to birth. An education for children. With many photos (transl .: Perdita Pasche). Bertelsmann, Gütersloh 1975. 31 pages. ISBN 3-570-05375-X
  • Lennart Nilsson: A journey into the inside of our body. The defense system of the human organism (In collaboration with Jan Lindberg; text by Kjell Lindquist and Stig Nordfeldt; English translation by Clare James; German translation by Ernst Peter Fischer). Rasch and Röhring, Hamburg 1987. 194 pages.
  • Lennart Nilsson, Hans Wigzell: Livet . Max Ström, Stockholm 2006. - Dt: Life. Images from inside the human body (Translator: Rita Seuss). Knesebeck-Verlag, Munich 2006. 302 pages. ISBN 3-89660-340-X .

Movies

  • The Miracle of Life . PBS 1983. - German: The miracle of life
  • Fascination with life . Script, editing and direction: Mikael Agaton, Lars Rengfelt. Production: Wanngard AB, Bo G. Erikson Television 1996. Editing: Christian Floto. A co-production of Sveriges Television SVT 1 and others, in collaboration with Arte and others. (3 parts: 1. Origin and beginning ; 2. Unknown worlds ; 3. On the trail of miracles . 54 min. Each)
  • Discoveries for life . A film by Lennart Nilsson and Mikael Agaton. Written and directed by Mikael Agaton and Staffan Bergquist. Stem cell photography: Anke Brederlau. Production: Agaton Film & Television 2003. Editing: Heidemarie Petters and Gunther Vogel. A co-production by ZDF and others (Des découvertes pour la vie). 45 minutes.
  • Fascination love - the miracle of life . Film production on behalf of ZDF, DVD production i. A. of the Bavarian State Ministry for Labor and Social Affairs, Family and Women. Documentary by Lennart Nilsson. Production: Matthias-Film 2001.

Quotes

"Seeing is believing."

Web links

Commons : Lennart Nilsson (photographer)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Photographer Lennart Nilsson död . Dagens Nyheter , January 28, 2017; accessed January 31, 2017 (Swedish).
  2. ↑ Mikael Agaton: Reise in der Innste , TV program of the Südwestrundfunk , broadcast on August 18, 2010 at 11:45 pm
  3. ↑ In analogy to Da Vinci . In: Leben , p. 294
personal data
SURNAME Nilsson, Lennart
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swedish photographer
DATE OF BIRTH August 22, 1922
PLACE OF BIRTH Strängnäs , Sweden
DATE OF DEATH January 28, 2017
Place of death Stockholm , Sweden