For me, a photograph is most successful when it doesn’t answer all the questions and it leaves something to be desired. I like each picture that I take to be a testament to the individual character of my subject.Greg GormanĀ 

Greg Gorman is a celebrity photographer of quite some renown. He is a wine buff, vintner, instructor, foodie and all around good guy. I’ve known Greg for a couple of decades. He is a man of style and has a taste for the elegant. He is really an amazing portraitist. He has a timeless style. His portraits are dynamic and attention holding. While he is a celebrity photographer whose list of subjects includes everybody who is anybody in the movies, for someone viewing one of his works, the image holds the viewer’s attention, not the subject. Knowing who is in the photo is secondary to the image itself.

Celebrities and their movies

Greg Gorman by Mark Kitaoka 2010
Greg Gorman by Mark Kitaoka 2010

Based in Las Angeles, Greg Gorman has photographed celebrities and has seen his work on one-sheets for motion pictures. “Hurt Locker”, “Tootsie”, “Scarface”, “The Big Chill” “King Arthur”, “Pearl Harbor”, “Meet Joe Black”, “Pirates of the Caribbean Curse of the Black Pearl”Ā  and “Dead Man’s Chest”… you get the idea. From Dustin Hoffman, Bette Midler and Johnnie Depp to Howard Stern, Sharon Stone and Al Pacino to drop a few names of the famous he has worked with both on set and in his studio.

Photography and cinema

Greg earned a degree in photojournalism from the University of Kansas then went on to get his Master of Fine Arts in Cinematography. Besides working on several movies as their still photographer, he has appeared as a photographer in a couple of them ā€” “Six Days Seven Nights” with Harrison Ford and Anne Heche and “Tootsie” with Dustin Hoffman. He has played himself in several more.

Food and wine

Greg is a connoisseur of cuisine and vintages of fine wine. The people who sit for a Greg Gorman portrait often receive lunch made by his personal chef and wines he makes under the GKG label.

Awards, charities, exhibits

Greg has earned numerous awards for his work, among them the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Professional Photographers of America and one from the Lucie Foundation as well as the Pacific Design Center Stars of Design award.

His charitable work includes The Elton John AID Foundation, Focus on AIDs, Angel Art and PawsLA to name some of his many philanthropies.

His work has been shown at the Helmut Newton Museum in Berlin, and around the world.

Workshops

Greg holds workshops in Mendocino, California, Greece, Japan, Italy and New Orleans where students learn in master classes on lighting, posing, digital post-production and experience open forum critiques.

See more of Greg Gorman’s photography at gormanphotography.com

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