Jazz Greats: Classic Photographs from the Bank of America Collection

The images gathered in Jazz Greats: Classic Photographs from the Bank of America Collection offer an overview of music and movement captured with professional accuracy and acumen. This selection of black-and-white prints spans three generations and speaks to the histories of individuals and occurrences, in front of and behind the camera.

Jazz is historically in the forefront of African American music for its honesty, sensuality, and improvisational vigor. Chuck Stewart’s portraits of iconic saxophone players Eric Dolphy and John Coltrane capture sensitive and sobering moments off stage. A contemplative mood permeates Ed (Eduard) van der Elsken’s dark 1958 portrait of Louis Armstrong in formal attire, his trumpet lowered, taken during his performance at the Newport Jazz Festival that year.

The exhibition features 33 photographs by fifteen photographers, spanning primarily from the 1920s to the 1980s, and depicts artists from various genres in music and dance. Many are legends of the uniquely American art forms of jazz and modern dance; some are simply members of local communities entertaining their neighbors.

Artists in This Exhibition

• Michael L. Abramson (American, 1948-2011)
• Antony Armstrong Jones (British, 1930-2017)
• Jonas Dovydenas (American, b. Lithuania, 1939)
• Eduard (Ed) Van Der Elsken (Dutch, 1925-1990)
• Arthur H. Fellig (Weegee) (American, b. Austria, 1899-1968)
• William Gottlieb (American, 1917–2006)
• Milton J. Hinton (American, 1910–2000)
• Gjon Mili (American, b. Albania, 1904–1984)
• Lisette Model (American, b. Austria, 1901–1983)
• Barbara Morgan (American, 1900–1992)
• Gordon Parks (American, 1912–2006)
• Marc Pokempner (American, b. 1948)
• Aaron Siskind (American 1903–1991)
• Edward Steichen (American, b. Luxembourg, 1879–1973)
• Chuck Stewart (American, 1927–2017)

Summary thumbnail image credit: Chuck Stewart (American, 1927–2017), Billie Holiday, 1955, Gelatin silver print, Bank of America Collection. © Chuck Stewart Photography, LLC

At Bank of America, we believe that investing in the arts helps to build communities and has a positive impact on the lives of our clients and employees. We support a wide range of local and global nonprofit organizations with funding and programming to drive engagement, promote cultural sustainability, and make the arts more accessible and inclusive in the communities we serve, part of how we deliver Responsible Growth.

Our support of the arts includes offering our art collection to communities through curated exhibitions that museums and nonprofit galleries may borrow at no cost. Since launching this program in 2008, we have loaned our exhibitions over 175 times to cultural institutions around the world.