/PHOTOGRAPHERS/PHER WERNER BISCHOF

Werner Bischof


Plates contributed

The 6 plates attributed to Werner Bischof in the 1955 MoMA Master Checklist (Exhibition #569).

ID Country Section Year View
photo-0027 Japan Marriage and childbirth Clervaux
photo-0192 Japan Relationships and community Clervaux
photo-0208 Hungary Relationships and community Clervaux
photo-0272 Romania Relationships and community Clervaux
photo-0381 India Hardship, suffering, and war Clervaux
photo-0436 Indochina Relationships and community Clervaux

Notes

Six plates in the catalog (count verified by strict-match grep against data/photographs.csv 2026-05-09): photo-0027 (#30 Marriage, Japan), photo-0192 (#194 Classical Music, Japan), photo-0208 (#217 Adult Play, Hungary), photo-0272 (#283 Ring Around the Rosy, Romania), photo-0381 (#395 Famine, India), photo-0436 (#451 Faces, Indochina). Five carry a Magnum agency credit; #451 prints only ‘Swiss’ without Magnum (idiosyncrasy of the checklist). All six are posthumous: Bischof died May 16, 1954 in Peru — eight months before The Family of Man opened January 24, 1955. Born 1916 / died 1954 verbatim per src-icp-werner-bischof-archive (in repo, fetched 2026-05-09: ‘1916 - 1954’ / ‘Swiss’) and src-magnum-werner-bischof (in repo, fetched 2026-05-09; sidebar prints ‘b. 1916’ and ‘d. 1954’ on separate paragraphs with ‘Swiss’ below). The Magnum page records his early training verbatim: ‘He studied photography with Hans Finsler in his native Zurich at the School for Arts and Crafts.’ The Magnum page also records death verbatim: ‘Bischof died in a road accident in the Andes on May 16, 1954, only nine days before Magnum founder Robert Capa lost his life in Indochina.’ The 26 April 1916 day-month token (and the Zurich birthplace specificity at the city level rather than ‘native Zurich’ framing level) carry pointer status from src-nyt-1954-bischof-obit (in repo, NOT re-fetched in this round; carries verified: false). Magnum joining year 1949 verbatim per src-icp-werner-bischof-archive: ‘In 1949 he joined Magnum, a co-operative picture agency.’ Plate count corrected from 3 to 6 in this batch (issue #150).

External biography

https://www.magnumphotos.com/photographer/werner-bischof/

Sources
  • src-moma-exh-0569-master-checklist
  • src-nyt-1954-bischof-obit
  • src-magnum-photographer-bios
  • src-icp-werner-bischof-archive
  • src-magnum-werner-bischof
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