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Chris Higgins
The Kriegsmann Files - Found Publicity Photos
by Chris Higgins - August 31, 2007 - 1:40 PM

The Kriegsmann FilesFollowing up on Monday’s Square America post, _floss staffer Kara Kovalchik pointed me to The Kriegsmann Files, an archive of old publicity photos on Flickr.

The story goes that the photos were found in a Venice (California?) alleyway, discarded as trash, then picked up and cataloged online. Judging from the selection of 178 photos that found their way online, there’s a lot of material here. The photos are primarily the work of James J. Kriegsmann, who started out as the Cotton Club’s house photographer, taking publicity photos of many jazz greats. In his later work, Kriegsmann photographed the less famous among us — for example, he was the photographer for New York’s Miss Subways contest. Most (okay, maybe all) of the photographs in the Kriegsmann Files are of unknowns, many of which display a heartfelt earnestness that apparently didn’t translate into commercial success. Check out, for example: Moonfast, Silverlight, Nbuda Funkshun, Fairchild, Amerasia, and Lee Noble.

Read more about the photos or just sit back for a sweet slideshow.

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Comments (5)

  1. Man, he did my headshots a few months back…I had no idea!

    posted by Marika on 8-31-2007 at 3:35 pm

  2. That’s probably James Kriegsmann, Jr. — he’s still working in NYC (more at kriegsmann.com). The original James Kriegsmann died in the early 90’s.

    posted by Higgins on 8-31-2007 at 3:37 pm

  3. I was gonna say, that’s mean creepy, being photographed by a dead fellow? Thank you for the clarification– I’ll go to bed better educated tonight.

    posted by Marika on 8-31-2007 at 3:42 pm

  4. I grew up in the 70s, and now I’m hoping I didn’t look like these folks, but I fear I did. The platform shoes, the hair, the bell bottoms. Kiregsmann sure got his money’s worth out of those Roman columns, didn’t he?

    posted by Jill on 8-31-2007 at 4:19 pm

  5. “Check out, for example: Moonfast, Silverlight, Nbuda Funkshun, Fairchild, Amerasia, and Lee Noble.”

    Those are alright, but I can’t believe you didn’t link to Richard Naklie, Woody Allen impersonator. That’s my fave. He’s on the bottom of the second page of photos.

    posted by Rachel on 8-31-2007 at 8:24 pm

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