La Dolce Vita
2019-11-01 - 2020-01-19
Tony Vaccaro photographed on the set of “La Dolce Vita”, and nearing age 97, he indeed is living “the good life”. At the age of 21, Tony was drafted into the war, and June of 1944, now a combat infantryman in the 83rd Infantry Division, he was on a boat heading toward Omaha Beach, six days after the first landings at Normandy. Denied access to the Signal Corps, Tony was determined to photograph the war, and had his portable 35mm Argus C-3 with him from the start. For the next 272 days, Tony fought on the front lines of the war.
After the war, Tony remained in Germany to photograph the rebuilding of the country for Stars And Stripes magazine. Returning to the US in 1950, Tony started his career as a commercial photographer, eventually working for virtually every major publication: Look, Life, Harper’s Bazaar, Town and Country, Newsweek, and many more. Tony went on to become one the most sought after photographers of his day, photographing everyone from President John F. Kennedy and Sophia Loren to Pablo Picasso and Georgia O’Keeffe. “La Dolce Vita” is a major new exhibition of more than 40 photographs by Tony Vaccaro that includes several new discoveries from his archive being exhibited for the very first time.