Biography

Discussion

Lies Wiegman had a preference for painting and drawing. As a little girl, she received drawing lessons from Charley Toorop. But when it came time for her to choose a study, she was forced to make a compromise. Her parents wanted her to learn a profession from which she could make a living. In the end, Wiegman decided on the department of ‘Reclame en Fotografie’ (‘Advertising and Photography’) at the KABK (Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten, ‘Royal Academy of Art’) in The Hague. It was during her second year of study that Wiegman first took classes in photography. After receiving her diploma, she extended her study with a one-year programme in stage design at the École Paul Colin in Paris.

Upon her return to the Netherlands, Wiegman did the display windows and designed folders and brochures for the Laagland travel agency.

Wiegman felt a desire to travel abroad and seized an opportunity to visit the United States. Her initial destination was Kingstown, Pennsylvania. After a short while, however, she ended up in New York City. Here she found employment doing layout work as well as other tasks in the offset department of the United Nations. It was work done chiefly at night. During the day, she eagerly soaked up the city’s urbanity, observing people and children playing in the street. Before venturing out with a camera, she allowed herself to grow accustomed to the cosmopolitan lifestyle. She lived in Greenwich Village, a well-known artists’ neighbourhood in New York, where she was given an opportunity to become a member of the Village Camera Club, a group of amateur photographers. Here Wiegman received access to the club’s darkroom. It was via the Village Camera Club that she came into contact with leading photographers such as Eugene Smith, Robert Capa, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Erwin Blumenfeld, Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, and Lisette Model. These photographers gave lectures and assessed the photographic work of the club’s members. For Wiegman, being in contact with those who were like-minded provided an enormous boost. In particular, she was extremely impressed with Eugene Smith. In her view, Smith had remained ‘true to himself’ and required high standards when it came to the publication of his work in Life magazine.

In the first half of the 1950s, photo narratives began appearing in American magazines with greater frequency—a product of American culture’s highly visual orientation. Wiegman grew up, as it were, in this American culture, in which the image was increasingly being given priority over the story. Wiegman’s first photo narrative was about children playing in the streets of a Puerto Rican neighbourhood in New York City. She tried to get her piece published in an American magazine.

During an international photo competition organised by the magazine Photography in 1953, Wiegman was awarded a money prize of $1,000. She used these funds to invest in film material. Wiegman’s photos were published in magazines such as Times and US Camera. When in 1955 her tourist visa ran out, however, she was obliged to return to the Netherlands.

Prior to this, Wiegman produced a series of photos in New Orleans on assignment for the magazine Our World in 1954. It was a sequel to a reportage that she had previously done in Harlem, the black neighbourhood of New York.

One year following her return to the Netherlands, Wiegman traveled four months on a cargo ship headed to South America. The Rotterdam shipping company ‘De Havenlijn’ had commissioned her to photograph everything related to the ship’s cargo while travelling along the coasts of countries such as Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay. This included not only the port cities, but also those places in the interior from which the cargo (meat, coffee, animal hides) originated. The photos appeared in desk agendas for the years 1957, ’58, and ’59 respectively, published under the title N.V. Havenlijn Rotterdam Diary. Wiegman did the layout of these agendas herself. Here one can observe her preference for linear and formal patterns, sometimes achieved through contrasts in light and dark, at other times through composition.

On behalf of Ryam, a Dutch publisher of school agendas, Wiegman furnished photos for the book Mensen in Parijs (‘People in Paris’). Other Dutch photographers—including Ed van der Elsken, Johan van der Keuken, Sam Waagenaar, Fred Brommet, and Nico Jesse—also made extensive reportages on Paris at this time. Content-wise, Wiegman’s work is most similar to that of Jesse. She photographed on the banks of the Seine, the street markets, and people relaxing in the park. As such, the picture she portrayed of society was idealistic. In many cases, people are looking directly into the camera and showing their cheerful side. Wiegman photographed in her typical, sincere manner—always with an anecdotal approach. In Mensen in Parijs, this anecdotal aspect is additionally expressed by the visual rhyming found on its pages, such as the yawning man on the left and the dog hanging out a car window with its mouth wide open.

For Wiegman, the 1955 exhibition The Family of Man was a high point in the history of photography. She lauded Steichen for his initiative. This was precisely the same manner in which she herself approached photography: unfettered, void of technical tricks, and holding her fellow man in high esteem, always in a positive way. Fake drama in photography irritated her greatly.

Wiegman valued the American approach to taking photographs and expressed her critique of Dutch photographers. In the magazine Fotografie, she wrote in 1956 that American photographers were much more oriented towards people. In the Netherlands, by contrast, the emphasis was placed on abstraction and graphic quality, sometimes to the point of being sterile. With these words, she was targeting primarily the kind of photography practiced by members of the NFK (Nederlandse Fotografen Kunstkring, ‘Netherlands Photographers Art Society’).

The reportage that Wiegman made in 1959 on the city of Rotterdam, on assignment for Le Courier de l’Unesco, showed a different and surprising side of her personality. In this case, she assigned herself the task—in response to the commission—of expressing a city of light, air, and space, in which aesthetic and linear rhythm predominate. Wiegman’s panoramic shot of the square in front of Rotterdam Central Station, the dynamic side view of the newly built station itself, and the shot emphasising the rhythmic strength of Naum Gabo’s sculpture (standing in front of the ‘Royal Bijenkorf’ building), all affirm that Wiegman was likewise capable of producing objective photography.

Another aspect of Wiegman’s photography is demonstrated by her reportage on Salvador Dali, which she did on her own initiative in 1961 during a trip to Spain. In and around the artist’s home in Port Lligat, she was permitted to go where she pleased, resulting in an unforced depiction of the artist. A number of the shots depicting Dali himself at work portray him in a heretofore unseen, touching manner. Inspired by his work and photos, Wiegman made combination prints that were designed to convey a surrealistic atmosphere. Later, she took the liberty of reworking Dali’s portrait in the same fashion.

As early as the 1960s, Wiegman was passionate about environmental pollution. Her sentiment was sparked by reading an address made by the American Indian tribal leader Chief Seattle in 1855, spoken on behalf of his people at a time when their land was to be handed over to the American government. In her ‘reportage’ of approximately sixty photos, Wiegman juxtaposes culture and nature and denounces humanity’s repulsive culture of consumption. By manipulating the photos—i.e. through combination prints and the use of photographic techniques with which images are combined—she wished to express herself more concisely. The Vereniging tot Behoud van Natuurmonumenten (‘Association for the Conservation of Natural Monuments’) incorporated her photos in the book Bewaar het Land (‘Save the Land [Countryside]’), which was published in 1980 on the occasion of the association’s 75th anniversary.

While teaching at the School voor Fotografie (‘School of Photography’), creativity and fantasy began to play an increasingly larger role in Wiegman’s work. One exceptional series was the reportage on the transvestite group ‘Chez Nous’ which arose from a collaboration with Frederik Linck, a colleague at the school. This series shows that Wiegman had abandoned her timid photography, instead applying a working method that was more open and bold. Many of the photos from this series have been colourised with pencil.

In 1958, Wiegman moved to a home that was adjacent to the zoo in Wassenaar. Here she was able to photograph animals from very close up. In 1962, when pregnant with her daughter and pretty much housebound, she photographed her immediate surroundings. Animals were her main topic. In 1965, Wiegman’s children’s book Mijn lama (‘My Lama’) was published: a photo narrative with a text written by Miep Diekmann. The photos of children and animals together radiate an ingenuousness inherent to both. One observes a mutual interest, something that Wiegman managed to communicate. The play of (raking) light creates a poetic atmosphere; movement and action provide the liveliness essential to any children’s book. Wiegman had a difficult time getting her book published. She blames the economic circumstances (the oil crisis) of that time, but also the fact that ‘colour books’ were gaining in popularity. The climate in the Netherlands anno 1965 was as yet unprepared for this development: Esso was the only company interested in introducing the book on the Dutch market, and then only as a business relations gift. The book was also published in Germany, by Hans Reich Verlag in Munich.

Hereafter, Wiegman also produced small photobooks for children featuring a kangaroo, Mein Känguruh Fanny (‘My Kangaroo Fanny’), and Mein Affe Pop (‘My Monkey Doll’), which featured a monkey in the leading role. She also worked on the children’s books De kleine geit (‘The Little Goat’) and Toy de poema (‘Toy the Puma’). These last two narratives, however, were never published. By this time, the number of children’s photobooks being brought out on the European market was growing. The French photographer ‘Ylla’ was also making photobooks of a similar nature. Robert Doisneau was also publishing various children’s books. In 1960, he produced a dummy for a photo narrative that was virtually the same as Wiegman’s, featuring the lamb ‘Kalou’, who becomes lost and is adopted by a couple of children. In the end, Doisneau felt the book was too ‘silly’ to be published.

On the Greek island of Rhodes, Wiegman took a series of shots for a photobook about a girl who experiences an incident in her dreams. This book was also never published.

Wiegman’s approach to her images became much freer. In 1967, she stated in the magazine Foto: ‘I want to be rid of reality and to bring back the fairy tale aspect in my work.’ With these words, Wiegman was addressing her own creativity, which she had not yet allowed herself prior to this time.

En saga om paradiset (in Swedish: ‘A Tale of Paradise’), published in Stockholm in 1971 with a text by Margareta Strömstedt, was also intended for children. In the same year, the book was also published in the Netherlands under the title De eerste dag (‘The First Day’), with a text by Mies Bouhuys. In order to spark the imagination, Wiegman applied various techniques in this paradisiacal story in an effort to situate children and animals in magical, peaceful, and natural surroundings. The book was published in six languages and received positive reviews. The First Day seems very much inspired by Ata Kandó’s photobook from 1957, entitled Droom in het Woud (‘Dream in the Forest’), which radiates a similar poetic atmosphere.

From 1956 to 1957, Wiegman worked on the photobook People, which was never published. In 1984-85, she produced a portfolio for the unpublished book Touch, which centred on the relationships person-child, child-animal, person-person.

Eventually, Wiegman gave up social reality in order to address the issue of compassion for one’s fellow man through a greater degree of self-expression.

In her early period (until 1960), Wiegman had only a minimum of photographic equipment on hand: a small, handy 6×6 Exacta camera was enough, as she felt no desire to be an intruder. In 1960, she began photographing with two Rolleicords. Wiegman rejected a 35 mm camera as being overly meticulous. In the magazine Foto of the same year, she related: ‘Vision is much more important than technique.’ By this time she was taking only candid shots: straightforward, void of gimmick or technical manipulation, and using available light. Flash as not an option, not even when photographing a priestess in Bahia (Brazil) in an accommodation with little light. In her approach, Wiegman was supporting the then generally held notion that good photography is based on a person’s actual, physical reality.

When Wiegman began making more visual narratives in the mid-1960s, she wished to create an appropriate mood. To achieve this, she distorted or exaggerated reality using combination prints and manipulations, for instance, by composing photos. To accomplish a greater spatial effect, she turned to photomontage. On occasion, she introduced a photo with linear patterns or an image with texture as a background for a combination print.

In 1969, Wiegman began teaching ‘free creative photography’ at the MTS voor fotografie en fotonica (Middelbare Technische School, ‘Intermediate Technical School of Photography and Photonics’) in The Hague. The variety in the photo assignments she devised for her classes inspired an even bigger shift in her work: she ‘discovered’ surrealist photography as a way to give reality new meaning.

Wiegman never felt at home, as she described it herself, when it came to working with colour photography. She preferred mainly black and white, because she placed importance on the creative choices that came with making her own prints.

In the Netherlands, Lies Wiegman played a role in the introduction of children’s photobooks. The notoriety that came with this work, however, ultimately overshadowed the rest of her oeuvre: a humanitarian portrayal of society expressed through countless reportages that were produced all over the world.

As a teacher at the School voor Fotografie en Fotonica in The Hague, Wiegman strove to incorporate greater creativity in the school’s study curriculum, which was primarily technical in orientation.

Documentation