Josef Breitenbach was born on the 3rd of April 1896 into a middle-class wine-merchant family of Jewish descent. He attended technical high school from 1912–15 and trained as a salesman for an instrument firm and later as a book keeper for an insurance firm. He attended Ludwig-Maximillian University in Munich (philosophy and art history, 1914 to 1917) and became active in the Youth Section and later the Pacifist wing of the Social Democratic Party. In 1918, he took part in the Soviet-inspired Bavarian coup d’état, which was the first spark of the revolutionary fire that swept over Germany in the wake of the armistice. For a few months, Breitenbach also occupied an official position in the new government. Although the revolution was short-lived, the ties he forged with the radical circles of Munich’s intelligentsia later helped him establish his reputation as a photographer.
In 1932, after several unsuccessful years at the head of the family business—during which period he was mainly engaged with perfecting his use of a camera—Breitenbach opened his first photographic studio. His clients were prominent members of Munich’s bohemia, including actors and actresses performing in the Munich theater. Munich was a stronghold of libertarians and refined people, whose spirit Breitenbach captured in theatrical portraits of his friend, the journalist Theo Riegler. This world vanished in 1933 with Hitler’s takeover.
More than his Jewish roots, the photographer’s political past made him a target for persecution. In August, 1933, a band of Sturmabteilung (SA) storm troopers, members of Hitler’s private army, banged on the door of his studio. Using a portrait of German nobleman Franz von Papen he’d taken the year before when he was Chancellor of Germany, and a letter of thanks he’d received, Breitenbach convinced the troopers that he was under Papen’s protection. With his passport about to expire, Breitenbach made his way to France a few days later, joining other German exiles seeking refuge in Paris.
The Surrealist “revolution” had by then become dominant in the Parisian art scene. Soon after his arrival, Breitenbach came into contact with André Breton and his circle. Preferring to retain his independence, he never became a member of the Surrealist group, but did show work in important exhibitions of Surrealist photography alongside Man Ray, Jacques-André Boiffard, Brassaï, Eli Lotar, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Roger Parry.
Breitenbach only lived in Paris for six years, until the war broke out in 1939. Yet during this period, he produced some of his most inventive work. He adopted several techniques favored by new photographers such as superimpression, montage, solarization, printing in negative, and the photogram. More importantly, he was one of the rare artists of the pre-War years to produce color photographs, which he did by using processes of bleaching, toning and pigmentation. Examples are the images “Montparnasse”, “Portrait of a Woman in Black and Red”, and Forever and Ever.
During his years in Paris, he was also an active member of the German exile community, which alerted the democratic world to the threat of fascism. He participated in the 1938 exhibition by the Union des Artistes Allemandes Libres, “Five Years of Hitler Dictatorship”. A high point for Breitenbach was his collaboration with Bertolt Brecht, summarized by portraits of the playwright. The war interrupted this second chapter of the photographer’s life. Interned by the French as a suspicious alien, then drafted into a civilian corps composed of foreigners, Breitenbach eventually escaped to New York from Marseille in 1941.
Breitenbach seemingly had no trouble adjusting to America. New York, the city in which he would spend the rest of his life, became home to him, as evidenced by his photomontage of 1942, “We New Yorkers”. He responded to the electric beat of the city, composing photographs such as “Radio City” (1942) that have a jazz-like quality.
The 1950s and 1960s were years of intense activity for Breitenbach. He did photographic reportage in Asia for the United Nations and other varied businesses, documenting relief work. He exhibited his photographs extensively in the United States from the 1940s to the mid-1960s, including at the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The time not spent on the road was spent absorbed by his teaching at Cooper Union and The New School.
Since his death in New York on the 7th of October 1984, there have been 26 one person exhibitions of his work, shown in New York, Paris, Berlin, Munich, and multiple other locations in both Europe in the United States. Eight books have been published on his work, including two by Larissa Dryansky (Josef Breitenbach and Josef Breitenbach Manifesto) and Josef Breitenbach Photographien, published by Schirmer/Mosel. The Josef Breitenbach archive is located at the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona, Tucso
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Monarchs In The Snow
Rhino Wars
Pacific Storm, 3rd Place, Landscape. An isolated cumulonimbus storm developed over the Pacific Ocean a few miles south of the coast of Panama City. It sat atop a temperature inversion that created a thick overcast layer of clouds. The strong updrafts of the storm quickly reached the tropopause and spread out, creating the characteristic anvil. The strongest updrafts pierced the tropopause and turned into what scientists call the overshooting tops. The entire frame was lit by a single lightning from within the storm in a moonless night on June 16, 2016. © Santiago Borja
Toxic Vanity, 3rd Place, Environmental Issues. This image is a magnification of plastic particles in eyeliner, exploring just one facet of the synthetic swarm suspended in our oceans. The particles, lash-lengthening fibers, illuminating powders, and glitters these products contain are in fact tiny pieces of plastic. Every time we wash these products from our bodies or ingest them as we lick the glosses from our lips, we unknowingly add to the trillions of microplastic particles currently infesting every level of the ocean. This photograph was taken at Falmouth University in Cornwall, United Kingdom, in May 2016 using a reflective photographic microscope with a stacking panoramic process to create the final image. © Eleanor Ryder
Crow Chasing Buffy Owl, Honorable Mention, Animal Portraits. This shot was taken on an early September afternoon along the riverbank at Pasir Ris Park in east Singapore. I was hoping to capture wildlife in action when some movement in the bushes nearby caught my attention. Instinctively, I prepared my equipment to capture any action that might ensue. I was fortunate enough to witness this adult crow chasing an adult buffy fish owl right in front of me, proving at once that the crow was the more aggressive species of the two. The entire spectacle between these day and night creatures lasted less than two seconds and exemplified nature in its uninhibited form.© Kawrence Chia Boon Oo
Approach, 2nd Place, Action. An EF2 tornado bears down on a home in Wray, Colorado, on May 7, 2016. As soon as we were safe, as the tornado roared off into the distance through a field before roping out, we scrambled up the hill to check on the residents. Thankfully, everyone was all right, and we were grateful for that. As I was checking in with a young woman coming out of the basement, we became very aware of a strong new circulation right above our heads. We needed to run for cover and did so before saying a proper goodbye. © Tori O’Shea
Outside Facebook HQ, 2nd Place, Environmental Issues. Eighty percent of the San Francisco Bay Area wetlands—16,500 acres—has been developed for salt mining. Water is channeled into these large ponds, leaves through evaporation, and the salt is then collected. The tint of each pond is an indication of its salinity. Microorganisms inside the pond change color according to the salinity of its environment. This high-salinity salt pond is located right next to Facebook headquarters, where about 4,000 people work every day. © Chris McCann
No Snow, No Ice? Honorable Mention, Environmental Issues. A solitary bear sits on the edge of Barter Island, Alaska. There is no snow when, at this time of year, there should be. The locals in Kaktovik noted that it’s been an unseasonably warm winter, and that the ice will be late in forming this year. This will have an impact on the local polar bear population when it comes time to hunt seals for their food in the winter months. © Patty Waymire
Wildfire at the beach, Honorable Mention, Environmental Issues. A young woman in a bikini looks at an approaching forest fire near the beach. A firefighting plane drops water to extinguish the wildfire. This image was taken at the beach of Son Serra, on the island of Mallorca, on August 18, 2016. © Sergej Chursyn
Proud Momma, 2nd Place. Animal Portraits. A female peacock bass guards her brood in a Miami, Florida, freshwater lake. She will protect her young fry from a variety of predatory fish until they are large enough to fend for themselves. This tropical freshwater species, also known as the peacock cichlid, was introduced in Florida in the mid-1980s from South America to control the tilapia population, another invasive species. Throughout its native range (and in Florida) it’s a prized sportfish known for its fighting spirit. © Michael O’Neill
Wild Rink, 2nd Place, Landscape. The first cold days of winter have frozen the surface of a pond, and the first snowfall has revealed its delicate beauty. In low-pressure conditions, southwest winds push the clouds against the vertical peaks of the Pale di San Martino. At dusk, a long shutter speed enhances the movement of the clouds around Cimon della Pala, one of the highest peaks in the Dolomites. © Alessandro Gruzza
Dragging You Deep Into the Woods! 1st Place, Animal Portraits. I shot this at Amboli, Maharashtra, India, on July 24, 2016, during a morning stroll into the blissful rain forest. Ceaseless drizzles dampened the woods for 10 hours a day; the serene gloom kept me guessing if it was night or day. The heavy fog, chilling breeze, and perennial silence could calm roaring sprits. And there I saw this beauty. I wondered if I needed more reasons to capture the habitat, for I was blessed to see this at the place I was at. I immediately switched from the macro to the wide-angle lens and composed this frame. © Varun Aditya
Serendipitous Green Meteor, Honorable Mention, Landscape. Anand Varma was visiting me and I was showing him around a mountain range in South India called the Western Ghats. We camped on the side of a road and I set up my Nikon D600 and a 24-70mm lens to take 15-second exposures. I set the camera to take 999 images. I slept next to the camera and it continued taking pictures until dawn. It wasn’t until the next afternoon that I reviewed my images and noticed something unusually bright and green. I showed it to Anand, and we realized that I had captured an extremely rare event. After checking with a few experts, I learned that it was a green meteorite, and getting it on camera is very rare. This is an example of being at the right place at the right time to capture something totally unexpected. For those 15 seconds, I was the luckiest photographer on the planet. © Prasenjeet Yadav
Great Egrets Take Flight, 3rd Place, Action. A remarkable conservation success story, the graceful great egret was saved from the brink of disappearance in Hungary, where in 1921 there were only 31 mating pairs remaining. Less than a century later, international conservation efforts have triumphed. We can now count over 3,000 mating pairs in Hungary alone. Today, although their numbers are continuing to climb, the great egret remains the Hungarian Nature Conservation’s symbol, and they are still considered an endangered species that must be carefully protected. The birds are most active at dawn and dusk, and here they’re squabbling over food and jostling for space in the crowded swamp. © Zsolt Kudich
Jellyfish Feast, Honorable Mention, Action. I came across this jellyfish on a dive in Byron Bay, Australia. At the time there was a single turtle eating various parts of the jellyfish. Soon, two more turtles arrived in full force and started a tug-of-war to keep the best bits of the jellyfish. I moved in closer to position myself in between the action as the turtles snapped at each other and continued to eat, oblivious to my presence. Soon there was little left of this giant jellyfish, and a small group of fish were evicted from their shelter within the stinging tentacles. © Scott Portelli
Friendship Knows No Color, 3rd Place, Animal Portraits. Two bodies of Empusa pennata in the same plant was the rare scene I found when I visited one of my favorite locations for macro shots. This area is located near a village called Las Rozas in Madrid, Spain. There’s a small stream about one kilometer long where you can find a varied ecosystem with many different types of insects and arachnids. From May to September, I had seen up to four different Empusas alone on their plants, but on this day I was extremely lucky when I found two individuals on the same plant. I took advantage of such a discovery and mounted my macro set and took several photos of this magical scene, where the Empusas seem to play or dance, sharing the same plant like good friends. © Jose Pesquero Gomez
This project carried out by locals is for aging wine directly in the ground which is rich in minerals, and makes the already awesome landscape of Lanzarote even more interesting. 
In this photo we can see the Vineyards of Monferrato exalted by the radiant light which caresses the valley enhancing the typical autumn colors of the rows of vines. 
I took this shot from the suggestive La Morra’s Belvedere. During autumn, the hills of the Langhe area present a variety of colors and shades, from red to yellow, from green to brown. 
A Moldovan vineyard photographed during the winter season is enhanced by the geometrical connotation of the image attained through the texture of the rows and the dividing line drawn by the road that separates two vine varieties 
This image is about the traditional grape harvest in Sicily. The title in dialect refers to the must, picked and pressed in a cylindric shape. In this picture, you can see all the wine flowing from the pressed must. 
This shot captures the moment after harvesting in which the grapes are arranged by a Sicilian farmer before they are to be pressed. 
A stage of the process of Chines wine making. This distilled wine is made with a brewing process which is thousands of years old and has been declared as intangible cultural heritage of China. 
Charlotte Green, castle owner in Seggiano, discovered some old Etruscan wine-making basins. Here she is taking a rest in one of them with her Sangiovese grapes. 
